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Masters of Jazz, Vol. 11

Storyville Records

$14.99 Jul 01, 2006

This compilation features Billie Holiday singing many classic standards including Strange Fruit, Lover Man, The Man I Love, All of Me, I Loves You Porgy, I Love My Man, Them There Eyes and Do Nothing ‘Til You Hear From Me. Her musicians on these sessions, recorded between 1944-1951 include Roy Eldridge, Hot Lips Page, Coleman Hawkins, Jack Teagarden, Art Tatum, Teddy Wilson, Jimmy Rowles, Oscar Pettiford and “Big” Sid Catlett.

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Masters of Jazz, Vol. 11
Storyville Records Jul 2006
CD
$14.99

In the Spirit of Toots / Jers, Carl Bagge Trio

Prophone

$20.99 May 19, 2023

I met Toots Thielemans in the summer of 2008 at a concert in Skåne, Sweden. Pleasantly polite, he asked if I wanted to play something for him. He said, “Play the blues in C.” He had me play the blues several times, adding a new challenge of music theory each time. After a while he appeared satisfied, chuckling and giving me a pat on the back. I was happy and thought “Wow, I passed the Toots jazz test!” After that we had some ice cream and coffee. We talked about the art of improvisation and harmonica technique, and Toots recounted memories of his long career. He made all his stories come alive with intensity. It was an enchanting afternoon that I’ll never forget.

For me, Toots is the ultimate musician. As with his storytelling, his playing is intensely alive. Few musicians play with the kind of love, playfulness and dynamism that he puts into his music. The floating rhythm, the lyrical playing and his way of communicating with and within the music put him in a class of his own. He moves with confidence between genres, different ensembles and instrumentations, and his tone reveals a unique timbre; a few notes are enough to let you know it is Toots who is playing. Toots has inspired me to be unafraid as a musician. Daring to mix genres, daring to play any tune, as long I do it with the joy of discovery in the moment. Daring to enter new groups and constantly learn more. And perhaps most importantly, seeing that communication with my co-musicians and the audience is what brings life to the music. This album is my thanks to Toots, for the inspiration he gave and continues to give me each time I hear his music. - Filip Jers

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In the Spirit of Toots / Jers, Carl Bagge Trio
Prophone May 2023
CD
$20.99

Kalabis: Symphonies, Concertos / Kosler, Neumann, Kalabis, Belohlavek

Supraphon

$47.99 Feb 26, 2013

"The quality of the 10 orchestral pieces assembled on the three-CD Supraphon set of Kalabis reissues has to be heard to be believed, the more so since the music itself is rarely encountered in the concert hall, outside the Czech Republic, at least. But these three discs have more than their fair share of masterworks. If I were coming to Kalabis’s music with innocent ears, it would take only the opening of the Second Symphony of 1959–61 to convince me that I was listening to a major symphonist. The opening Andante moderato generates a sense of powerful foreboding which is released with terrific force in the Allegro molto e drammatico that follows in what one is beginning to recognize as one of Kalabis’s typical manically striding marches. The brooding slow movement, an Andante marked molto quieto (the work was composed at the height of the Cold War) again builds up the tension, dispersed this time in a gloriously long-legged fugue which gradually expands into a gloriously dignified Finale. The First Violin Concerto (1958–59) lies somewhere between Martin? and Shostakovich, perhaps closer to the latter, and is hardly inferior to either, with a bristlingly energetic opening movement, a dark and troubled slow movement (marked angoscioso ) with spiky and assertive central section, and a buoyant but sober Finale. The first disc closes with the 13-minute Symphonic Variations for Large Orchestra (1964). If the Dvorak Symphonic Variations were more often performed, I would recommend resting that score for an occasional hearing of Kalabis’s tightly argued and absolutely unsentimental score—but even the Dvorak rarely gets a look-in these days, so I fear there’s little hope of hearing the Kalabis live, more’s the pity.

The second disc opens with the Concerto for Large Orchestra, commissioned by Karel An?erl for the Czech Philharmonic and composed in 1965–66, which begins with one of Kalabis’s fiercest dissonances, but it’s one of those dense agglomerates which suggests resolution and, sure enough, an arching violin line emerges and purifies the air and, almost before we know it, we’re off on another of Kalabis’s white-knuckle allegro s; Kalabis described the middle movement as a “tragic meditation”; and the freewheeling Finale has something of the ferocious energy of the last movement of Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s Sixth Symphony, though Kalabis pauses for air rather more often. In contrast to the four-movement Second, the Third Symphony is in three movements, another of Kabalis’s galloping allegro s bookended by two uneasy essays, predominantly but not always slow and, as ever, with Kalabis, powered even at moderate tempos by the sense that there’s energy in plenty waiting to be given its head. Volume 2 ends with Kalabis’s Trumpet Concerto of 1973. R?ži?ková, who provides the booklet notes for the set, explains that, exceptionally, Kalabis was allowed to accompany her on a tour of France that year and, in a little town in Provence, he was given a statuette of the town crier, whose adventures the music depicts (hence the title, “Le Tambour de Villevieille”). Cast in two movements and 18 minutes long, it moves as easily as the other works here from knockabout vigor to anxious inaction. The drums that are occasionally heard in the first movement are, briefly, more prominent in the second and sound as if they are about to set up a tattoo but the music then sets off in a different direction. I find this work slightly less personal than the other pieces on offer here, but Kalabis’s craftsmanship is as evident here as elsewhere, and there aren’t so many good trumpet concertos in the world that trumpeters can afford to ignore this one.

Kalabis’s Harpsichord Concerto, composed in 1974–75 (no prizes for guessing who the dedicatee and first performer was), has something of the buoyancy of the Poulenc Concert champêtre and the angularity of neo-Classical Stravinsky—but far more of a sense of onward drive than either composer; indeed, it’s in the driving rhythms of the Finale that Kalabis comes closest to Martin? though, unsettlingly, it then subsides into anguished silence. R?ži?ková complained to her husband, only half-joking, that “You have let me die”; but the times in which it was written, he responded, did not permit another ending. Martin? was tangentially involved in the birth of the work, as R?ži?ková relates in her notes. She was performing the Martin? Concerto in Switzerland and the conductor asked if by chance she had heard of a Czech composer called Viktor Kalabis; much laughter ensued, and a commission soon after that. But don’t expect some maudlin love-letter: Kalabis obviously wanted to show the world what she could do, and the solo part is a demanding one; the piece is almost half-an-hour in length, too, which must make it one of the world’s longer harpsichord concertos. The second work on the third, all-concerto, disc is the Second Violin Concerto of 1977–78, performed by the much-missed Josef Suk, with whom R?ži?ková formed a duo in 1963, so it is good to see him represented here and find him in stellar form. Just over a quarter-hour in length, it’s in a single movement, as are the 22-minute Concerto for Piano and Winds (1985) and the 12-and-a-half-minute Concertino for Bassoon and Winds (1983)—the most explicitly Stravinskian works in this collection. All three are tightly argued, the first two earnest and generally grave in manner, with the Concertino exploiting the capacity of the bassoon to suggest boisterous and slightly preposterous good humor, though there are also a number of passages of almost hieratic starkness.

The performances throughout make the case for the music as convincingly as you could ask. The recordings were made between 1968 and 1991 and have come up well. A few slips from the soloist in the Trumpet Concerto suggested it might be a live recording, a suspicion confirmed by the subsequent applause; a cough and the occasional noise serve the same function in the Bassoon Concertino.

Altogether, this is an excellent survey of some of the major works of one of the major voices of recent times. Taken together with the MSR box (if you do not know the Fourth Symphony, you should not let yourself live in ignorance of it much longer), it should help Kalabis’s name before a Western public, even if it’s largely the small part of it that buys recordings. Bit by bit, one hopes, some of Kalabis’s oeuvre might begin to appear in concert, where audiences will cheer it to the rafters. In the meantime, I urge you to acquire this box and do some hollering at home."

FANFARE: Martin Anderson

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Kalabis: Symphonies, Concertos / Kosler, Neumann, Kalabis, Belohlavek
Supraphon Feb 2013
CD
$47.99

Grigory Ginzburg Early Recordings, Vol. 2: Chopin, Weber & Schumann

APR

$18.99 May 01, 2010

GRIGORY GINZBURG: His Early Recordings • Grigory Ginzburg (pn) • APR 5667 (Volume 1; 77:29); 5672 (Volume 2; 78:34); mono

Volume 1: BEETHOVEN/RUBINSTEIN Turkish March. LISZT Hungarian Rhapsodies : Nos. 10, 11. Les Cloches de Genève. Paganini Etudes: Nos. 3, 4, 5 . Venezia e Napoli. Rigoletto Paraphrase. LISZT/BUSONI Fantasia on The Marriage of Figaro. GINZBURG Transcription of Largo al factotum. BALAKIREV Islamey

Volume 2: BACH/BUSONI Toccata and Fugue in d. WEBER Rondo brillante in E?. SCHUMANN Paganini Etudes: Nos. 2, 3, 4. “Abegg” Variations. CHOPIN Impromptus: Nos. 1, 2, 3. Fantasy Impromptu . Polonaise in B?. Polonaise in A?. STRAUSS/GRUNFELD Voices of Spring. STRAUSS/SCHULZ-EVLER Concert Arabesque on The Blue Danube

These have to be among the greatest piano records ever made. Grigory Ginzburg (1904–61) was virtually an exact contemporary of another great Russian pianist, Vladimir Sofronitzky, and while neither was known in the West while alive, Sofronitzky has developed a somewhat wider reputation with the music-loving public than Ginzburg. After listening to these two CDs, and then following up with excellent volumes of live performance recordings on the Vox Aeterna label, it is clear to me that Ginzburg was one of the giants of the keyboard in the 20th century—different from, and at least the equal of, Sofronitzky.

Ginzburg was a student of Alexander Goldenweiser, one of the most significant of the Russian teachers of the first half of the 20th century. His early death prevented him from touring outside of Russia, because most of that happened after 1961. Some of his contemporaries, like Lev Oborin, lived into the 1970s and appeared in America and Europe. Gilels was born in 1916, but lived into the middle 1980s and had a big international career. Soviet artists before 1960 were buried, at least to the rest of us, inside Russia. And since they didn’t concertize in the West, neither did they record for any of the international labels—instead confining their recorded work to Melodiya. As more of this material comes out, we see what treasures were hidden behind the iron curtain. Among all those treasures, Ginzburg stands out.

What makes this piano playing so special? Just about everything. He makes the most difficult music sound easy—whether it is Liszt Paganini Etudes or his own transcription of Figaro’s “Largo al factotum” from The Barber of Seville , nothing seems to actually present any problem to his fingers. Every note is articulated with precisely the right weight and color; everything is in perfect proportion. His sense of balance between the poetic and the virtuosic is unique. He plays with flair and theatricality, but at the same time with a beauty of tone and purity of line that always touches as much as the virtuosity amazes. Even on these recordings, which date from the 1940s and 50s, the beauty of Ginzburg’s tone comes through (especially in Bryan Crimp’s superb transfers), and the remarkable variety of his dynamics is jaw-dropping. There seems to be an infinite number of variants of mezzo-piano , or piano , or forte . Listen to the repeated notes in Liszt’s La Campanella and you’ll be almost physically shocked at the clarity and evenness of the playing. Every single note is in place— completely in place. What is particularly unique about his playing is that he manages to have great fun with the showy elements of this music without a hint of vulgarity. The Liszt Hungarian Rhapsodies can easily be cheapened by over-indulging. Or they lose their character by a pianist taking them too seriously. Ginzburg does neither—all of the fun and flair that you would want is here, but at the same time a deeper beauty that one does not always encounter in this music. And if there is a pianist with a more vocal sense of singing line, of what a true cantabile is, I haven’t encountered him.

After you have heard Ginzburg’s playing on these two discs, which consist entirely of shorter pieces, you might well want to go on to explore the five volumes of live performances released on Vox Aeterna. You can do an artist search at ArkivMusic to find them. Larger works such as Schumann’s Carnaval , Chopin sonatas, and Liszt concerti are available in that series.

I don’t think you can compare Ginzburg to any of the other Soviet-era pianists. He’s not Gilels, he’s not Richter, he’s not Lazar Berman. He is, in fact, Grigory Ginzburg, a pianist who, like any great artist, defines his own territory. We are indebted to APR for making these two discs available, and for the superb quality of the production. In addition to excellent transfers, Bryan Crimp provides illuminating, intelligent notes.

FANFARE: Henry Fogel

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Grigory Ginzburg Early Recordings, Vol. 2: Chopin, Weber & Schumann
APR May 2010
CD
$18.99

Taneyev: Violin Sonata, Piano Music / Olga Solovieva, Et Al

Naxos

$19.99 Oct 27, 2009

TANEYEV Violin Sonata in a. 1 Theme and Variations in C. Repose. Scherzos: in d; in g; in e?; in C; in F. Prelude in F. Quadrille. Andantino semplice. Prelude and Fugue in g?, op. 29. Romance, op. 26/6 (arr. Feigin) 1 • Olga Solovieva (pn); Ivan Peshkov (vn) 1 • NAXOS 8.557804 (72:41)

After several decades in the wilderness, Sergey Ivanovich Taneyev (1856–1915) is enjoying somewhat of a comeback, with a number of recent recordings introducing him anew to audiences that may have known his name but have heard little of his music. With Nikolai Rubinstein as his piano teacher and Tchaikovsky as his instructor in composition, Taneyev graduated from the Moscow Conservatory with honors. He made his concert debut in Moscow in 1875 playing Brahms’s D-Minor Concerto, and the following year he toured Russia as accompanist to the great violinist Leopold Auer.

Unfortunately for Taneyev, a dyed-in-the-wool musical conservative who distinguished himself as a performing artist in the works of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven, and who, as a composer, cast his countenance ever further West and further back than Tchaikovsky, becoming an expert in the techniques of 15th-century vocal polyphony and 16th-century counterpoint, he ran afoul of his Russian nationalist contemporaries. No love was lost between them. Taneyev was disdainful of the “Mighty Handful,” publicly reproaching Balakirev, calling Borodin “a clever dilettante,” and remarking that Mussorgsky made him laugh. He was a bit more deferential towards Rimsky-Korsakov, respecting the composer of Scheherazade for his serious study of counterpoint.

Taneyev’s personality and outlook are perhaps a bit easier to understand when one realizes that he was, in his own mind, anyway, an unfairly untitled aristocrat. Coming from a wealthy family, he enjoyed the resources to pursue his interests in science, history, mathematics, and philosophy. Traveling extensively, he rubbed elbows with literary figures such as Zola and Flaubert, and with musical celebrities such as Franck and Saint-Saëns. Taneyev’s attitude towards the progressive composers and modern music of his day was not dissimilar from that of his older but longer-lived French contemporary, Saint-Saëns; both abhorred what they saw as unschooled, undisciplined dilettantism in any field of endeavor, but especially in music and the arts. When Tchaikovsky left his position at the Moscow Conservatory in 1878, Taneyev replaced him; during his tenure there, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff, Gliere, and Medtner, among others, benefitted from Taneyev’s teaching, though each went his own way once out from under his influence.

The five scherzos for solo piano on this CD, written between 1874 and 1875, are asterisked as being world premiere recordings. And grateful we should be to pianist Olga Solovieva and Naxos for outing them, for they are gem-like beauties, which, in melodic and harmonic vocabulary, are heavily indebted, according to note author Anastasia Belina, to Schumann and Tchaikovsky.

The major work on the program, Taneyev’s 1911 A-Minor Violin Sonata, carries the subtitle, “Of medium difficulty.” The piece was new to me, though there is another recent recording of it listed on the Northern Flowers label. Melodically, as well as in the close exchanges and echoing back and forth of material, the writing bears resemblances to the op. 12 violin sonatas of Beethoven, not surprising, given Taneyev’s Classical leanings and his touring with Auer. Based on the hearing of it—I don’t have the score—I’m fairly confident in saying that the piece is technically easier to play than the Beethoven sonatas. Filled with charming melodies for the violin and delightful effects in the piano part, Taneyev’s Sonata would make a wonderful work for any moderately advanced violin student.

Though Naxos is not claiming premiere recording status for the C-Major Theme and Variations, this is the only current listing I find for it. The piece is a student work dated 1874. Taneyev was 18 at the time and still under Tchaikovsky’s supervision. According to Belina’s note, Taneyev’s exercise was heavily influenced by Tchaikovsky’s “Thème original et variations,” the concluding number in his Six Pieces for Piano , op. 19, which appeared in 1873, the year before Taneyev wrote his work. Evidence in support of Belina’s contention comes in the form of a theme Taneyev borrowed from the finale of Tchaikovsky’s Second String Quartet as a counter-melody in the second variation. The transmigration from Tchaikovsky’s Quartet to Taneyev’s Variations must have happened at the speed of light, for both works were written at virtually the same time.

Of the remaining pieces on the disc for solo piano, the Quadrille is the most interesting and the longest at almost eight minutes. Careful listening reveals that Taneyev did not use the title flippantly or fancifully. He was too much of a stickler for correctitude. Technically and formally, a quadrille is an ancient and very complex dance that became all the rage, alongside the waltz craze, in 19th-century Vienna. If written according to the Viennese form, which Taneyev’s is, the dance is comprised of six sections: (1) an open rondo-form, the “Pantalon,” in 2/4 or 6/8 time; (2) the “Été,” always in 2/4; (3) the “Poule,” a closed rondo form, always in 6/8; (4) the “Trénis,” a mirrored binary form (A-B-B-A); (5) the “Pastourelle,” a modified rondo, always in 2/4; and (6) “Finale,” a double ternary form (AA-BB-AA) in 2/4 time in which each statement of the theme is eight bars in length. It’s fascinating to listen to the precision with which Taneyev adheres to the formal scheme in his whirligig Quadrille.

Finally, there is the Romance adapted for violin and piano from the composer’s song cycle, Immortelles . The appearance of the right-hand piano’s notes on the page is alleged to resemble the stalactites of the song’s title, “Stalaktitï.” While there is a static “dripping-tears” character to the piece, I wouldn’t put too much stock in the analogy, especially if you, like me, associate stalactites with the freakish icicle-like formations found in cold limestone caves. Taneyev’s Romance may be tearful, even sentimental, but it’s heartwarming in the same way that the fourth in the set of Dvo?ák’s Four Romantic Pieces , op. 75, is. In fact, Taneyev’s Romance bears a striking resemblance to the Dvo?ák.

This is a thoroughly winning disc. The more of Taneyev’s music I hear, the more I think he has been undeservedly eclipsed by the very dilettantes he despised. He wasn’t a Russian nationalist in the mold of the “Mighty Handful,” but his music may actually be better crafted than theirs; and, to me at least, it’s more appealing than that of some of his more renowned students. Ivan Peshkov is wonderful in the two violin works, and Olga Solovieva, as both soloist and accompanist, is one of the best advocates Taneyev has. Urgently recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Taneyev: Violin Sonata, Piano Music / Olga Solovieva, Et Al
Naxos Oct 2009
CD
$19.99

Glenn Gould - The Russian Journey

C Major Entertainment

DVD

$26.99 Sep 24, 2013

Also available on Blu-ray

A film by Yosif Feyginberg

The date is May 2nd, 1957. Stalin died only four years before and perestroika is still a long way off. However, the Canadian pianist Glenn Gould, who is just 24, arrives in Moscow for an exceptional tour: he is the first North American musician to play behind the iron curtain. This is the story that Glenn Gould in Russia tells by revealing documents from the Canadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs that had remained classified for years. Witness accounts from musicians such as Ashkenazy and Rostropovitch, parts of the original recordings of Gould’s concerts in Moscow and Leningrad, as well as a recording that had never been released before of his lecture-recital in Leningrad make this an invaluable documentary revealing an aspect of Glenn Gould’s artistry that few people are aware of.

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM 2.0 (Historical material: Mono)
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English, German, French, Korean
Running time: 60 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

R E V I E W: 3754520.zz6_GLENN_GOULD_RUSSIAN_JOURNEY.html
GLENN GOULD: THE RUSSIAN JOURNEY • Glenn Gould (pn); various artists; Yosif Feyginberg (dir) • C MAJOR 714108 (DVD 56:00)

What could have easily been a dull and routine affair—after all, little film footage and few recordings exist of Gould’s historic May 1957 tour of the USSR—turns out to be a stunning and fascinating film that riveted my attention from first to last. Part of this documentary’s charm, and value, comes from the fact that Gould’s trip is explored in full detail, including his initial shock at not being able to sleep in a double bed and a postcard he sent back home to his dog! All of this, plus the warm reminiscences of the men and women who met him, acted as guides and/or translators, or heard him play, not to mention the actual voice of Gould himself recalling the ups and downs of his journey, adds layer upon layer to the story until you actually start to feel that you are watching a documentary made at the time, as if Glenn Gould himself had been able to participate in its making.

What caused such a furore? As this video tells us, part of it was the fact that Bach, so long a musical persona non grata in the Soviet Union for his strong association with religious works, came as a revelation to most of his Soviet audience. The hall for his first concert in Moscow—the complete Bach The Art of Fugue, a work most people had never even heard—was not even half full when he began. Partway through the first half, however, people ran out of the hall to pay phones and called friends, relatives, colleagues, and told them that they had to come down ASAP and hear this man. By the time the concert ended, the hall was packed, not only with breathless lay spectators but also with musicians, and the Russian audience went absolutely berserk. In ensuing performances, and there were several, Gould opened up his repertoire to include the other love of his life, composers of the Second Viennese School. He even gave a lecture-demonstration of their music before an audience of lay listeners, students, and even professors at the Conservatory. The entire Russian musical world seemed to want to absorb Glenn Gould like a sponge. As one of them put it, halfway through the concert-lecture on Berg, Webern, and Schoenberg, some of the students became restless; it was all a bit too new and foreign for them, and they begged him to play Bach. “We brought him back down,” the commentator said. But Gould responded positively to the rapt attention he received, and to a certain extent I think that it was upon his return to North American concert life that he became increasingly restless about performing in person because he felt that the majority of audience members were inattentive or only half-listening.

Yet his impact on the Russians, and theirs on them, went much further than just playing and talking to them. Sviatoslav Richter, at the time (as Gould relates) practically unknown in the West, went up to him after a concert, congratulated him, and invited him to one of his own. Mstislav Rostropovich then later recalls something that Richter had told him: “I can play Bach as well as Gould, but I won’t do it because it would take me too much time to rehearse it and too much concentration!”

Nowadays, there is a counter-reaction to Gould’s Bach. Once viewed as ultra-modern, crisp and unbelievably lucid in the revealing of the inner voices, it is now sometimes thought of as willfully distorted: the slow sections are played too fast, the fast sections even faster or too slow. Yet for others, Gould’s architectonic approach to the music remains miraculous simply because, for all its clarity and consistent tempo, it lives and breathes. It has feeling despite, not because, of its rapid pace. And that is what is often missing in the playing of modern-day pianists who approach Bach; yet all of them should be thankful to Gould for making it acceptable to play Bach on the piano and not only or always on the harpsichord or clavichord. The crisp, staccato sound of his particular Steinway model is forever etched in the minds of his listeners.

After Gould returned to Canada he was unable to go back to the USSR again; after 1964, the welcoming window of opportunity closed for a very long time. But he continued to talk about the Russians on his CBC television programs, to play their music (the video includes clips of him performing the Shostakovich Piano Quintet and a Prokofiev sonata), and to talk about the difficulties the Russian people faced under the Soviet system. He sent his recordings to them to be reproduced on the Melodiya label and continued to receive warm letters from those he had met and some he had not. It was, in short, a very cathartic experience for him, even if he did beg his doctor for “those little yellow pills” (valium) that calmed him down so he could take them on his trip.

This is a fascinating and extraordinarily well-put-together documentary of an exceptional trip, and time, in the life and career of an exceptional pianist. I highly recommend it.

FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

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Glenn Gould - The Russian Journey
C Major Entertainment Sep 2013
DVD
$26.99

Flying Saxophone Circus / Turkovik, Selmer Saxharmonic

MDG

SACD

$24.99 Apr 01, 2010

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

3425040.zz5_FLYING_SAXOPHONE_CIRCUS_Milan.html

FLYING SAXOPHONE CIRCUS • Milan Turkovi?, cond; Selmer Saxharmonic • MDG 910 1625-6 (SACD: 59: 01)

SHOSTAKOVICH Suite for Variety Orchestra. DVO?ÁK Slavonic Dances, op. 46/1, 7, 8. MILHAUD Scaramouche. GERSHWIN American Stories Suite. MATITIA Devil’s Rag

If Flying Saxophone Circus , the title of this CD, conjures up images of a troupe of madcap comedians and “something completely different,” I think you have gotten the point. As the program notes, with their references to magical materializations in Red Square and abductions by jazz-loving space aliens make clear, here indeed is a unique experience. With this eclectic program of Shostakovich, Dvo?ák, Milhaud, Gershwin, and Jean Matitia, played by a saxophone dodectet (I’ve waited my whole life to use that term) called the Selmer Saxharmonic, this is about as different as things get here in the classical aisle.

The Shostakovich Suite for Variety Orchestra (post 1956)—usually misidentified, as it is here, as the lost-but-now-located 1938 Suite for Jazz Orchestra No. 2 —is the perfect opener for a disc of this title, as the style of these delicious waltzes, polkas, and gallops, taken from film and ballet scores, is strikingly similar to music played in Russian circuses. (That the composer could apparently write these crowd-pleasing tunes with the same skill and conviction as his darkly intense symphonies and string quartets is a mystery worthy of further exploration. It surely doesn’t sound like slumming to me.) The band’s multilayered saxophone sonority expands on the color offered by the four saxes in the original orchestration, with some excursions into pizzicato and other sounds usually alien to reed instruments. The performance of the insinuating Waltz No. 2, made familiar in Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut , is particularly convincing.

The other works are just as effectively done. The Saxharmonic’s Dvo?ák dances capture the Slavic flavor while adding the colorations of his wind serenade, the saxophones morphing credibly into flutes, oboes, clarinets, and bassoons. The Scaramouche may seem a bit heavy at first, but well before they get to the “Brasileira” one almost begins to believe it was written for this ensemble. Then the German musicians transform into a 1930s dance band—with an amazing sax line—for the suite of Gershwin show tunes arranged by French saxophonist Jean-Marie Londeix. They finish off with the fiendishly difficult Devil’s Rag for 12 saxophones by another French sax player and teacher, Christian Lauba, writing under the nom de plume Jean Matitia. Pure magic.

But I go on too long. So, here’s the endorsement: This is the group I’d want to book if I was having a cost-no-object party. The ensemble boasts 12 of the finest saxophonists in Germany, playing everything from sopranino to bass. The music is ingenious and accessible to a wide variety of tastes. The arrangements, most of them by tenor saxophonist Christoph Enzel, are technically sophisticated, true to the various styles, and great fun. Bassoonist/conductor Milan Turkovi? (he still plays in the Vienna Concentus Musicus) leads lively, idiomatic performances. These range from subtle to brazen as appropriate, with not a trace of the stiffness that often creeps in when wind ensembles tackle orchestral repertoire. The sound is magnificent and the notes are a hoot . Why wait? Drop your copy of Fanfare (temporarily of course) and get to your favorite retailer post haste. If you enjoy this repertoire, or the sound of saxophones, you will love this SACD.

FANFARE: Ronald E. Grames

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Flying Saxophone Circus / Turkovik, Selmer Saxharmonic
MDG Apr 2010
SACD
$24.99

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REAL GONE MUSIC

$57.82 Mar 06, 2026

ULTIMATE COLLECTION STEVE LAWRENCE / EYDI GORME The first track on this 4-CD set is "This Could Be the Start of Something Big," and it sure is: here, at last, is the Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme collection all of their fans have been waiting for, the biggest and (by far) best-sounding set ever devoted to the pair of legendary pop vocalists. Under the supervision of their son David Lawrence (who contributes a personal note to the booklet), we've gone back to the original tapes for most of these 72 tracks; some of these have never appeared on CD, and, with Eric Boulanger's new remastering, the ones that have come out sound much better than they did before. Disc One, "Duet Classics," features such career touchstones for the couple as "Baby It's Cold Outside," "For Once in Your Life," and "We Got Us." Disc Two, "Steve Classics," brings the hits with "Portrait of My Love," "Footsteps," and "Go Away Little Girl" along with such signature renditions as "I've Gotta Be Me" and "I Want to Be with You" and even an unreleased track, "You and I." Eydie takes over (and how!) on Disc Three with such smashes as "Blame It on the Bossa Nova," "What Did I Have That I Don't Have," "If He Walked into My Life," "Tonight I'll Say a Prayer, and her Spanish-language classic with Trio Los Panchos, "Sabor a Mi." And Disc Four revels in the duo's love of Broadway with songs like "Mama, A Rainbow," "The Ladies Who Lunch," "Two on the Aisle," and the uproarious "The Honeymoon Is Over." Like this collection, Joe Marchese's liner notes follow Steve and Eydie's career every step of the way, and we've included some rare photos courtesy of the estate. The ultimate collection indeed, the comprehensive, career-spanning collection these two icons have long deserved!

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ULTIMATE COLLECTION
REAL GONE MUSIC Mar 2026
CD
$57.82

Fuchs: Serenades Nos. 1 & 2 / Christian Ludwig, Cologne Chamber Orchestra

Naxos

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 50% Mar 29, 2011

Robert Fuchs (1847-1927) is best known today as the composition teacher of Mahler, Sibelius, Enesco, Korngold, Schreker, Zemlinsky, and just about everyone else who happened to be at the Vienna Conservatory from the late 19th century onward. As a composer he earned the respect of Brahms, probably because Brahms didn't feel threatened by him, and was totally forgotten after his death. During his lifetime he was best known for his string serenades, two of which feature on this recording, along with the late (and quite substantial) Andante and Capriccio Op. 63.

Let's get straight to the point: the music is wonderful--gracious, tuneful, not a note too long, and an unalloyed delight from first note to last. Yes, it's not "heavy" or "serious", but really, who cares? If you like Dvorák's or Tchaikovsky's string serenades, or Grieg's Holberg Suite, or Sibelius' Valse triste, then you are going to love this disc. The performances are perfect: flowing, rhythmically clean and snappy, immaculately tuned, and affectionately phrased. It just doesn't get any better, and the sonics are pristine. The Viennese, of course, have always been suckers for light music, but that only made them particularly discerning. They went crazy for Fuchs. Check out this disc and find out why.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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FUCHS Serenades: No. 1 in D; No. 2 in C. Andante grazioso and Capriccio • Christian Ludwig, cond; Cologne CO • NAXOS 8.572222 (53:52)

His friends called him “Serenaden-Fuchs” (Serenading Fox), a pun on his name, while the sparingly complimentary Brahms praised him as a “splendid musician.” He was Robert Fuchs (1847–1927), an Austrian composer and professor of theory and composition at the Vienna Conservatory whose students comprised an extraordinary roll-call of up-and-coming talents: Enescu, Korngold, Mahler, Melartin, Sibelius, Schmidt, Schreker, Wolf, and Zemlinsky.

As a musical genre the serenade found itself largely neglected after Mozart, at least until Brahms revived it with his two symphonic-scaled serenades in the late 1850s. Despite Mozart’s lending a greater gravity to the form, especially with his so-called “Gran Partita,” the genre continued to carry the stigma of its 18th-century antecedent as a type of lightweight, summer’s eve, al fresco entertainment, at a time when Austro-German Romanticism in particular saw itself as cultural custodian of the serious and the profound. Thus, even after Brahms’s two mid 19th-century examples, it would be another 25 years before composers would enrich the repertoire with serenades that, in content and dimensions, resembled symphonies or symphonic suites in all but name.

When Fuchs came to compose his First Serenade in 1874, his main models were the two efforts by Brahms and the three serenades by Robert Volkmann (1869–70). But by the time he got around to composing his fifth and final serenade in 1894, many masterly and magnificent serenades had already made their way into the world: Dvo?ák (1878), Tchaikovsky (1880), Strauss (1882), Wolf (1887), Suk (1892), and Elgar (1892), and not long after, Reinecke (1898); Dohnányi (1902), Sinding (1902 and 1909), Reger (several between 1904 and 1906), and Stenhammar (1913) would add to the growing list.

If the serenades had been Fuchs’s only contribution to music, it might explain why he virtually vanished from the mainstream almost immediately after his death, even though he’d been highly regarded in his own day. But the fact is that Fuchs worked in all the major musical media and his output, which included symphonies, concertos, a large volume of chamber works, three masses, and two operas, was considerable and diverse. And all of it—at least the works I’ve heard—is nothing but expertly crafted and melodically inspired.

Of Fuchs’s five serenades, the first three are scored for strings only and the fourth adds only two horns to the string ensemble. In the string-only pieces, however, textural richness is achieved through division of parts, so that for much of the time we are hearing six or even seven voices. Sometimes the violas play divided parts; other times, first or second violins are divided; and still other times violins and violas are divided at the same time. This lends both breadth and depth to the writing, allowing for greater fullness and luminosity to the sound as well as greater flexibility to the interplay of voices as they overlap and weave around each other.

As I said, if the serenades were Fuchs’s sole contribution to music, his disappearance from the scene might not be so surprising, for I will be the first to admit that these are not the stuff great reputations are made of. They were popular in their day precisely because they were the popular music of the day. As one listens to these serenades, especially their fast-paced movements, it’s easy to discern how Fuchs’s style was influenced by the polkas and quadrilles of Johann Strauss Jr., another composer, by the way, much admired by Brahms. So associating Fuchs with this type of crowd-pleasing entertainment music is not to denigrate him as a composer. His symphonies, concertos, and chamber works tell us that he was a man of both talent and substance. His serenades are tuneful, occasionally touching, and always enjoyable, reminding me in ways of some of Grieg’s orchestral music, like the Lyric Suite.

In checking all of the usual mail-order sources, I was surprised to find no complete collection of Fuchs’s five serenades. In fact, you would have to hunt down some fairly obscure labels featuring some fairly provincial ensembles to find recordings of Nos. 3 and 5, not to mention other versions besides this one of Nos. 1 and 2. And I had no luck at all finding even a single recording of No. 4. I guess I hadn’t realized when I began this review just how far Fuchs’s serenades had fallen on hard times, for the rest of his output in general is reasonably well represented on disc.

The Andante grazioso and Capriccio that concludes the disc is no insignificant filler. At 17 and a half minutes, it’s longer than the Serenade No. 2, and, written in 1900, it’s a work postdating the last of the composer’s serenades. Harmonically more advanced and complex, and emotionally darker than the serenades, the piece, suggests note author Anthony Short, is an example of Fuchs the teacher being influenced by his students, namely Sibelius.

One can only hope that this new recording of the first two serenades with the Cologne Chamber Orchestra directed by Christian Ludwig is the first in a survey that will bring us the remaining three, for in every respect the performances and recording are excellent. Strongly recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Fuchs: Serenades Nos. 1 & 2 / Christian Ludwig, Cologne Chamber Orchestra
Naxos Mar 2011
CD
~~$19.99~~ $9.99

Rudolf Kempe Conducts Dvorak & Strauss

ICA Classics

DVD

$26.99 Feb 22, 2011

This new DVD preserves some superb performances directed by a conductor of the highest calibre, performing live and at the peak of his abilities.

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STRAUSS Ein Heldenleben 1. DVO?ÁK Symphony No. 9, “From the New World 2” • Rudolf Kempe, cond; 1 Royal PO; 2 BBC SO • ICA 5009, mono (DVD: 89:22) Live: Royal Albert Hall, London 1 8/28/1974; 2 8/29/1975

How absolutely wonderful it is to see Rudolf Kempe, looking hale and fit, ascend the podium and direct an absolutely magical performance of Ein Heldenleben with his usual minimum of podium fuss, his face mirroring both the music’s changes and his obvious pleasure at hearing it emerge the way he wants, the Royal Philharmonic members playing their little hearts out for him. This is exactly the way I always imagined Kempe in performance, as close to Toscanini’s podium style as any conductor who outlived him, eliciting that magical, transparent sound, ignoring nothing in rhythmic acuity and liveliness, and now we have the pleasure of seeing how he did it.

The sound is still mono but the images are in color. The members of the orchestra look completely rapt in concentration; everything in this performance is focused on the music, nothing on how they look to the audience. A bit dull to watch? Perhaps. But, like watching such similar conductors as Toscanini, Doráti, and Böhm, it amazes one that such exuberance of spirit and a rich palette of colors can emanate from such outward calm and control. For make no mistake, Kempe was a master of coloration. He knew how to make an orchestra “speak.” He knew the secret, now lost to a modern generation of conductors, of how to play music like this so that it sounded not only beautiful but noble, eschewing bombast in favor of the long line, the gradual ebb and flow of suspense, and—I reiterate—that unbelievable palette of colors he had at his disposal. Kempe’s strings had the sound of a choir singing.

In my experience there was only one performance of Ein Heldenleben I really loved prior to hearing this performance, and that was Willem Mengelberg’s 1941 broadcast with the Concertgebouw Orchestra. The Concertgebouw of that time was by no means the technically precise instrument that the New York Philharmonic of 1928 was, in his Victor recording, but there is so much more detail and drama in the later performance that I forgave the roughly played passages. Kempe’s Heldenleben is an entirely different animal. The contrasts are all musical, not as dramatic, but with a flow and coloristic quality that make the score sound more akin to the upward spiral of ascending angels than to Mengelberg’s explosive reading (though they join hands in “The Hero’s Deeds of War”). There is nothing like it in my experience, not even Kempe’s studio recording for EMI, because the studio recording adds the goop of mid 1960s reverb to a performance that doesn’t need it. Here we have, if you will, Kempe urtext, and the result is simply mind-boggling. Listen, for instance, to the way he makes the low bass passage resound with great depth without sounding heavy or ponderous. His legato flow is seamless, the accuracy and crispness of his attacks and releases flawless. It was exactly moments like these that took your breath away when listening to a Kempe performance.

Yet he resented EMI’s pushing him as a Wagner and Strauss specialist. Kempe conducted a great deal more than that, Schubert, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Dvo?ák, Shostakovich, and Bruckner among them, and all of them well (he’s one of the few conductors besides Furtwängler who, to me, made some sense of Bruckner’s succession of endings in his symphonies), and here he follows Heldenleben with the “New World” Symphony of Dvo?ák. Unexpectedly, his performance of this symphony is startlingly dramatic, having almost the punch and drama of Toscanini’s excellent 1953 recording, only with Kempe’s patented transparency. The orchestra swells and ebbs flawlessly and naturally under his guiding hands; an unexpected rubato after the brief flute solo is picked up with tremendous force when the brass and high strings erupt again. Dozens of little details—clipped rhythmic accents here, buoyant legato bridges there—mark this interpretation as unique.

Kempe uses a fairly small baton, even a little smaller than Toscanini’s but not as tiny as the toothpicks that Strauss and Reiner used. His arms are a little further apart than Toscanini’s, but he is only slightly more animated on the podium, his arms moving in graceful arcs. Only a few months after the Dvo?ák performance came the shocking announcement that Kempe had died. I can remember that moment as if it were yesterday; it grieved me more than you can imagine. He had a very special gift, sought by many but bestowed on few, and we are all the poorer for his untimely passing.

FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

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In a letter to his friend, the distinguished French man of letters Romain Rolland, Richard Strauss categorically denied that he was the model for Ein Heldenleben: “I am not a hero. I have not got the necessary strength; I am not cut out for battle; I prefer to withdraw, to be quiet, to have peace.”

Some commentators may have refused to take Strauss at his word, but the uncredited director of this BBC transmission of a 1974 Proms concert is clearly not among them. His view of things is crystal clear for, throughout the whole of the work’s first section, a musical depiction of Der Held (The Hero), he resolutely directs his cameras at the conductor. There is, in fact, not a single second of that opening 4:59 of music when Rudolf Kempe is not pictured on-screen, whether in close-up, middle distance or in long-shot. The corollary of that fact is that as soon as we begin the work’s second section, Des Helden Widersacher (The Hero’s Adversaries), we start to see the orchestra members on their own – but maybe I am now stretching my theory of the supposed relationship between the visual images and the “text” just a little too far.

Even though Kempe’s widow Cordula records in the DVD booklet notes that her husband “thoroughly resented” being pigeonholed as a Strauss (and Wagner) specialist, his affinity with Strauss’s music was well recognised at the time. His record company EMI persuaded him to set down the complete orchestral works on disc. No less a personage than the Queen Mother reportedly gushed “Oh, Mr Kempe, when will you do the Alpine Symphony again?” (rather a surprise, given recent revelations of the sort of music she listened to at home). And, as evidenced in this performance taken from the conductor’s very last concert with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the 1974 Promenaders were quite over the moon with this Ein Heldenleben; critic Joan Chissell reported that this performance elicited “a hero’s ovation and rightly”.

Having never seen Kempe conduct live or on film before, the first thing that struck me was just how physically charismatic and animated he was on the podium. By fastidious, very precise gestures with both his baton and the fingers of his left hand, he coaxes some exquisite sonorities that we can fully appreciate thanks to his scrupulous care for orchestral balance - and to the installation of fibre-glass acoustic diffusing discs on the Royal Albert Hall’s ceiling just five years earlier, successfully reducing its notorious echo.

The outstanding characteristic of Kempe’s interpretation is that, by the application of both sensitivity and sensibility, he gives Strauss’s score the opportunity to breathe. This is, indeed, anything but a brash, bombastic account: the orchestra plays with notable and carefully controlled intensity and Erich Gruenberg’s substantial violin solos are especially affecting - he justifiably gets a special roar of approval from the Promenaders as he takes his bow.

If the Strauss is very fine indeed, the Dvorák is, however, outstanding. Edward Greenfield’s booklet notes suggest that its distinguishing feature is the wide range of dynamics that Kempe applies. What struck me most, however, was the interpretation itself. In contrast to performances that emphasise the score’s elements of cheery Bohemian bonhomie, Kempe’s is a deeply serious account.

The opening movement is characterised by fierce attack and precision - wonderful playing from the BBC orchestra - and Kempe minimises the elements of lyricism in favour high drama. In a similar vein, the second movement’s sentimentality is entirely played down. Its well-known “big tune” ( Goin’ home, Goin’ home, I’m a goin’ home / Quiet like, still some day, I’m just goin’ home) is moved purposefully along and the fervent manner in which its central section is played communicates, to this listener at least, a distinctly uneasy feeling of agitation and unrest.

Kempe’s interpretation is nothing if not consistently of a piece for the scherzo and the allegro con fuoco finale are similarly driven powerfully forward. The formers elements of bucolic rusticism are given short shrift and the latter, right from its opening bars, emerges as a real daredevil ride and is terribly exciting - while still very skilfully controlled and crafted.

This New World is one that emerges as a real eye-opener and a very different work from the one that we’re usually presented with. It justifiably receives a huge ovation from the audience.

This new DVD, then, preserves some superb performances. The direction – originally for BBC TV - is expert and thus almost entirely unobtrusive, the visual image - in colour throughout - is sharp and pleasing and the sound is more than acceptable. It offers an opportunity to acquaint or reacquaint oneself with a conductor of the highest calibre, performing live and at the peak of his abilities.

-- Rob Maynard, MusicWeb International

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Rudolf Kempe Conducts Dvorak & Strauss
ICA Classics Feb 2011
DVD
$26.99

Brahms: Symphony No 4, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO

Naxos

$19.99 Sep 25, 2007

Top Brahms!

Here it is: the final release in the set of Brahms symphonies from Marin Alsop with the London Philharmonic. Previous reviews have praised just about every aspect of this new Naxos cycle, and while I admit to arriving somewhat late on the scene I have to admit that all expectations are realised.

So that you know where I’m coming from, my formative introduction to the symphonies of Brahms came with the 1983 live cycle on DG with Leonard Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic. The influence of those initial impressions of intensity and edgy freedom of expression are of course hard to shake, but there is always more than one way to skin a great piece of music, and later on I was as likely to be found settling down with a good book and Herbert von Karajan’s 1989 recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic. Other versions have passed my way as well – Günter Wand’s 2001 RCA cycle with the North German Radio Symphony Orchestra for instance, and those lovely old Bruno Walter recordings with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra now on Sony, which still sound surprisingly good given their vintage.

If done properly, Brahms’s symphonic writing means that you will have read the same page a multitude of times in that ‘good book’ you have in your hand while listening. The content and meaning of the words will remain as obscure as at the first attempt as your ears and attention are absorbed and enthralled by the lush musical garden that gradually unfolds through your loudspeakers, or in my case headphones. With Alsop and the LPO you might as well give up on reading at all, and give yourself over to a feast of wonderful music-making.

Marin Alsop’s tempi are measured and sustained in what seems to me an ideal way in this symphony. The first movement seems at first urbane and restrained, but the ceiling is set high, and there is plenty of room for bite and drama in the music – never hurried or unstable, but with a gloss of perfect preparation which seems to allow the listener to plunge directly and deeply into Brahms’s inspired vision. The same is true of the second Andante moderato movement, in which the winds initially shine with lush resonance. Intonation is crucial here, and the LSO’s wind and brass are spot on – playing as one. The timing and anticipation is beautifully measured in advance of the ‘big tune’ at 8:55, which is turned out here without histrionics, but as a noble and almost infinite field of sound – a bounteous source for a composer like Elgar, whose own ‘Enigma’ variations spring immediately to mind.

A lightness of touch is required of the third movement’s Allegro giocoso, and Alsop blows away any cobwebs which may have gathered in a sweep of freshness. There’s a slightly anticipatory rhythm at 4:23 caused by an edit, but this will hopefully only be noticeable to fully trained and overly picky reviewers. The final movement brings back the measured, sustained feel of the first, but with that extra turbulence, and those quicksilver touches of detail in the orchestration pointed subtly and superbly by all concerned in this recording. I was wondering if that slow central section wasn’t just a little too slow and lingering, but the re-entry of the full orchestra at around 6:00 is made all the more magical for being delayed for that extra few ounces of ‘down-time’, and the final run builds in intensity to create a fully satisfying close.

The Hungarian Dances presented here are the ‘leftovers’ from Brahms’s own orchestrations of nos. 1, 3 and 10, covered in volume 2 of this series. The dances here have been newly orchestrated by Peter Breiner in an imaginative commission from Naxos especially for this recording. Breiner’s versions respect Brahms’s orchestral resonances for the most part, but inject quite a bit of extra jazzy impact and violinistic Hungarian idiom, emphasising some of those seriously fun syncopations with extra percussion and brass. There is a danger of creating a set of little P.D.Q. Bach monsters here, but with the essence of Brahms’s ideas held largely intact I admire the way Breiner has stretched these pieces just enough to make them into genuine orchestral showpieces, without turning the smiles they bring into disrespectful guffaws.

I think the way is clear – I simply must have the rest of this set.

-- Dominy Clements, MusicWeb International

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Brahms: Symphony No 4, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO
Naxos Sep 2007
CD
$19.99

Dvorák: Complete Cello Works / Jamnik, Netopil, Prague Radio Symphony

Supraphon

$37.99 Dec 17, 2010

DVORAK Cello Concerto in b 1. Lasst mich allein, op. 82/1 (arr. Lenehan) 2. Rondo in g, op. 94 2. Goin’ Home (arr. Fisher and Lenehan) 2. Songs my mother taught me , op. 55/4 (arr. Grünfeld) 2. Silent Woods, op. 68/5 2. Slavonic Dance in g, op. 46/8 2 • Alisa Weilerstein (vc); 2 Anna Polansky (pn); 1 Jirí Belohlávek, cond; 1 Czech PO • DECCA 0019765-02 (67:10)

DVORAK Cello Concertos: in A; in b. Rondo in g, op. 94. Silent Woods, op. 68/5 • Tomás Jamník (vc); Tomás Netopil, cond; Czech PO • SUPRAPHON 4034-2 (2 CDs: 89:53)

‘Tis apparently the season for me to review recordings of Dvorák’s cello concertos; in the previous issue (37:5) I discussed the recent pairing of those two works by Steven Isserlis, and now in addition to these two sets I also cover a historic live performance with Pablo Casals elsewhere in this issue. This is not a complaint, mind you; far from it. The B-Minor Concerto is both one of my very favorite concertos for any instrument (along with the Brahms D-Minor Piano Concerto and the Bruch G-Minor Violin Concerto), and on my short list (say, my top 25 entries) of favorite orchestral works, so it is always a treat to encounter it again. And, given my deep love for Dvorák’s music in general (only the operas do not register with me), I have a great fondness for the early A-Major Concerto as well, despite its obvious flaws.

In my review of the Isserlis recording, I regretfully opined that “there is no doubt for a moment that one of the world’s great cellists is playing, and that he has a very fine conductor and accomplished orchestra as his partners. Somehow, however, a fully idiomatic feeling for this work eludes their sensibilities.” No such complaint can be made about either of these two recordings; both are very good, if perhaps just shy of the very top tier, albeit for different reasons. Still only 32 years old, Alisa Weilerstein has already been deservedly established for several years as one of the world’s top cellists, and no one should take my previous critical review of her DVD of the Elgar Concerto in 34:4 as indicating a lack of admiration for her on my part. On the contrary: in November 2009 I heard her play the Dvorák B-Minor Concerto with Peter Oundjian and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and “breathtakingly superlative” is a woefully inadequate description of that performance. (At one point in the finale, Weilerstein, Oundjian, and the orchestra wound one section down to total silence and held that for three or four seconds, and there wasn’t so much as a single cough or rustle from the audience.) Whereas that performance was deeply probing of the melancholic undercurrents of the score, this version is very much a young person’s take instead, with a total emphasis on sunny lyricism and the joy of homecoming. While the movement timings (14: 42, 11:23, 12:37) are thoroughly mainstream, the reading has a very brisk, occasionally even almost breathless, feel to it, with the eager enthusiasm of a high-spirited filly just waiting to bolt out of the gate for a frisky gallop. Ji?í B?lohlávek seconds Weilerstein at every step of the way, and of course the Czech Philharmonic has this music in its blood. As the contrast with the live Philadelphia performance I witnessed shows, the interpretive outlook here is one of very conscious choice; and while I favor a more ruminative approach that brings out the work’s more pensive side, this is a refreshingly different take that makes one think about it anew, and I heartily recommend it accordingly.

I am less enthusiastic about the rest of the disc, however. In the filler pieces—the G-Minor Rondo and Silent Woods in their piano accompaniment versions before Dvorák orchestrated them (though Silent Woods was first composed for piano four-hands), plus four shorter pieces in various arrangements (though no arranger is credited for the Slavonic Dance in G Minor)—Weilerstein is accompanied by pianist Anna Polonsky. While it is good to have the Lasst mich allein that the composer drew on for thematic references in the second and third movements of the B-Minor Concerto, as well as the Rondo and Silent Woods , the performances are rather generic in outlook, and the other three pieces are unimpressively fluffy makeshift fillers, with Goin’ Home coming off as too saccharine. I wish that all concerned in this enterprise would have thought to offer the Rondo and Silent Woods in their orchestral guises as well; certainly the disc had enough room for that, and it would have been a major selling point to offer both versions of those works together. Decca provides warm sound with a bit of distance and a touch of resonance; the brief booklet notes are perfunctory. A minor irritant is the “classical cheesecake” photo on the booklet cover of Weilerstein in the woods, in what I derisively term “fetching feral female form.” (The photo on the back tray card is infinitely superior and should have been used for the booklet cover instead.) I suppose this is what advertising executives think will sell some additional copies to the general public, but an artist of Weilerstein’s stature deserves much better.

Tomás Jamník is even younger than Weilerstein—by three years, to be exact. While his performance of the B-Minor Concerto is also a youthful one, it is such in the more generic sense of not yet having a strongly individual interpretive profile. Whereas Weilerstein is already a full-fledged major interpreter, Jamník is still a promising talent who has not yet arrived at the same degree of artistic maturity. This is not to imply that he is faceless or callow; he has beautifully burnished tone and secure technique, and he tapers dynamics and phrases with genuine feeling. He just hasn’t quite reached the point yet where all the fine individual moments coalesce into a larger, cohesive, distinctive unity. Much the same can be said for the still relatively youthful but increasingly prominent conductor Tomá? Netopil; he understands what the score needs to say at any given moment, but has not yet quite gotten to the point of integrating those moments together into a more memorable and sweeping overarching framework. Overall it’s a very good and enjoyable performance in a mainstream interpretation; it just faces impossibly stiff competition from the likes of Rostropovich and Fournier, to name just two figures whose recordings rank among the immortals.

However, this set is far more fortunate in its pairings than is the Weilerstein CD. In the Rondo and Silent Woods , Jamník and Netopil have the totally idiomatic feel needed to give these smaller-scale works their full and due measure. And then there is the youthful A-Major Concerto as the other and most welcome anchor to this set. Having covered its somewhat tortuous history in previous reviews, I will not repeat myself on that point here. What I will say is that this is one of the two best versions of the cello and orchestra version available, the other being the performance by Ramon Jaffé, Daniel Raiskin, and the Staatsorchester Rheinische Phiharmonie. (Of the remainder, the performance played and conducted by Alexander Rudin, reviewed by Jerry Dubins in 37:3, ranks an honorable third. Avoid the utterly wooden version on Supraphon with Milo? Sádlo, Václav Neumann, and the Czech Philharmonic on Supraphon; the pedestrian and long out of print performance on Koch with Werner Thomas-Mifune, Rudolf Krecmer, and the Bamberg Symphony; and the Isserlis recording of the misbegotten Günther Raphael version recently dissected by me in my aforementioned review. The unabridged original piano and cello version with Ji?í Bárta and Jan ?ech on Supraphon is a must for fans of the work, though I’m much less impressed with the pianist than with the cellist there.) To repeat briefly what I said at the end of the Isserlis review, Jaffé and Raiskin are the superior interpretive team, but if you place a heavy premium on beauty of instrumental tone then you will prefer Jamník’s greater warmth and depth to the somewhat more wiry sound of Jaffé. In all four works the Prague Radio Symphony, like its bigger brother the Czech Philharmonic on the Decca release, has imbibed the composer’s music as mother’s milk and gives its interpretive all. While Supraphon’s basic recorded sound is quite good, there are occasional odd moments (such as the very beginning of the first CD) where there is some slight incipient background noise, almost like the surface noise of an LP. Detailed booklet notes are provided in English, German, French, and Czech. Jamník is an artist to watch, and it will be interesting to hear him revisit these works in another decade or so; warmly recommended.

FANFARE: James A. Altena

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Dvorák: Complete Cello Works / Jamnik, Netopil, Prague Radio Symphony
Supraphon Dec 2010
CD
$37.99

Robert & Clara Schumann: Piano Trios / Swiss Piano Trio

Audite Musikproduktion

SACD

$21.99 Jan 29, 2013

C. SCHUMANN Piano Trio in g, Op. 17. SCHUMANN Fantasiestücke, Op. 88. Piano Trio No. 3 in g, Op. 110 • Swiss Pn Tr • AUDITE 92549 (SACD: 77:42)

This is now the third occasion on which I’ve been privileged to review a new release by the outstanding Swiss Piano Trio. The ensemble’s Mendelssohn trios received an urgent recommendation from me in 34:6, and its account of Tchaikovsky’s Trio, if not quite as enthusiastically received by me in 36:3, still earned my nod of approval. Expectations for this Schumann disc thus ran high, and, I’m happy to report, they were not disappointed.

Clara Schumann (1819–1896) was a devoted wife, loving mother, accomplished pianist, and, no doubt, a composer of some talent. But I’ve always felt that her eminence in the latter capacity has been exaggerated both by virtue of her being spouse to one of the most famous of romantic composers and for being somewhat of that 19th-century novelty, a female composer. It has thus come about that when someone is asked to name three or four women composers, Clara Schumann invariably tops the list. Yet, if one 19th-century composer of the female gender deserves equal billing with her male counterparts, it’s not Clara Schumann or Fanny Mendelssohn; it’s Louise Farrenc (1804–1875), a composer who wrote symphonies and chamber works on a scale and of a quality comparable to many of her male contemporaries.

The Piano Trio in G Minor, dated 1846, is Clara’s only large-scale chamber work; in fact, it’s her only chamber work of any scale, period. Most of her catalog consists of songs and pieces for solo piano, though, as a teenager, and later, with the help of her husband to be, she did try her hand at a Piano Concerto. The trio was long held to be Clara’s crowning compositional achievement; some even credited it with being the inspiration for Robert’s first numbered Trio in D Minor, op. 63, written the following year. Thus, I was rather surprised to find fewer recordings of Clara’s opus listed than I would have expected; and of those currently in the catalog, more than one logically pairs it with Fanny Mendelssohn’s Trio in D Minor, written in the same year, 1846.

Whether pairing Clara’s trio with Robert’s third and final Trio in G Minor, composed in 1851, is a logical choice or not, I can’t say, although it seems to me that juxtaposing Robert’s D Minor, the one supposedly inspired by Clara’s effort, would have made more sense. However, in addition to Robert’s G-Minor Trio, Clara’s trio also shares the disc with Robert’s 1842 Fantasiestücke , which, though otherwise named, is his actual first work in the medium, though not designated or numbered as such. The present program therefore makes this new release unique, at least insofar as other current listings are concerned, although another recent disc, which also happens to be in SACD format, contains Clara’s trio and Robert’s G Minor-Trio, but not Robert’s Fantasiestücke . That recording by the Boulanger Trio on the Ars Produktion label was filled out with a work for piano trio by Wolfgang Rihm, and was favorably reviewed by Steven E. Ritter in 33:5

I’ve not heard the Boulanger disc, but the playing here by the Swiss Piano Trio leaves nothing to be desired. I doubt that Clara’s trio has ever received a more loving performance. The only word that describes the ensemble’s tone is voluptuous, and Audite’s perfectly positioned and balanced recording affords that ideal sweet-spot perspective. I do agree with Steven that Clara’s trio is not Robert’s. One has only to listen to the first few bars of Robert’s G-Minor Trio to recognize the difference between talent and genius. But I honestly have to say that I don’t think I’ve ever appreciated Robert’s trio as much as I have in this performance. The Swiss players seem to be absolutely swept away by the score, sweeping me away in turn. It doesn’t even feel like they’re performing the piece as much as they’re becoming one with it and living and breathing it.

This is definitely going on my provisional list of Want List candidates for 2013, and I most strongly urge you to acquire it. The Swiss Piano Trio, in my opinion, has rapidly risen to become one of the very top piano trio ensembles on today’s stage.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Robert & Clara Schumann: Piano Trios / Swiss Piano Trio
Audite Musikproduktion Jan 2013
SACD
$21.99

Claude Frank: 85th Birthday Celebration

Sono Luminus

$21.99 Nov 16, 2010

CLAUDE FRANK 85th BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION • Claude Frank (pn) • SONO LUMINUS DSL-92122 (2 CDs: 138:12)

SCHUMANN Arabeske. Fantasiestücke: Warum. Kinderszenen: Traümerei. MOZART Piano Sonata in C, K 330. Rondo in a, K 511. SCHUBERT Piano Sonata in B?, D 960. BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas Nos. 30–32

The big question attached to this release is, “Why now?” Many collectors will recognize Claude Frank’s name from the complete set of Beethoven sonatas he recorded in the 1970s, and which were released on RCA Victrola LPs. (These now are available on Music & Arts.) There have been a couple of other releases since then—Beethoven’s and Schubert’s works for violin and piano, recorded with his daughter, Pamela Frank—but for the most part, Claude Frank is a major pianist who has been ignored by the recording industry. In other words, the present release is welcome, and very satisfying, and when I look at how many CDs Lang Lang has made since the start of his career, the infrequency of Frank’s recordings makes me mad.

Recorded in New York’s American Academy for Arts and Letters in 2008 and 2009, this pair of discs captures Frank a little before his 85th birthday. (He was born in 1925.) Initially, I thought that these were going to be live performances. Apparently they are not, but Frank’s playing, both intimate and communicative, suggests the presence of an audience of one—that being you, dear listener. Frank’s frequent vocalises, in the manner of Glenn Gould, will not endear these readings to everyone. Somehow, they add to the intimacy of the music-making.

In the generous booklet that accompanies this release, Frank discusses his lengthy studies with Artur Schnabel. (Frank studied with him between 1941 and 1951, but there was a break after he was drafted into the United States Army during World War II.) Frank’s repertory has much in common with Schnabel’s, and his playing resembles his teacher’s in several ways as well. Above all, effect for effect’s sake is rejected. Frank’s playing is not flashy, but it goes right to the music’s core like an arrow seeking the bull’s-eye. One way in which it differs from Schnabel’s is in Frank’s occasional use of a technique in which the left hand slightly anticipates the right. (This can be clearly heard in the middle movement, the Allegro molto, of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 31.) I know this drives some listeners crazy, and if you are one of them, consider yourself warned. Frank doesn’t do it often enough to make it a mannerism, though. In the sequence of repeated G-Major chords that ushers in that final section, Frank (I think through a combination of pedaling and touch) creates a sonority I have never heard coming from a piano. A little later, in the final fugal section, Frank realizes Beethoven’s odd rhythmic dislocations with greater clarity than I have heard from any other pianist. In the three Beethoven sonatas, Frank does not suffer in comparison to his younger self, and the engineering is better, too.

The other performances are terrific as well. In Schubert’s sonata, Frank captures a quality that I consider essential to much of the composer’s later work, that being the song of a bird who sings still more beautifully even as he perceives that a cat is about to pounce on him. A similar quality pervades the Mozart Rondo in A Minor. Mozart’s Sonata in C is unaffected—it is neither fragile Dresden china nor a jolly rugby scrum. The Schumann miniatures are warm but not overly sentimental. Frank understands that romantic music does not mean “anything goes.” Above all, in all of these works, including the Beethoven, Frank lets the music speak for itself. Like the finest pianists at work today (Perahia, Lupu, Schiff, etc.), his personality supports the music and does not compete with it.

The musicianship on these discs stands up to anything else in front of the public at this time. Piano mavens whose heads are not turned by mere virtuosity should acquire this release immediately, if they have not done so already!

FANFARE: Raymond Tuttle

These 2008/09 recordings were made in anticipation of Claude Frank's 85th birthday on December 24, 2010, and testify to the veteran pianist's seasoned musicianship and remarkably intact technique. Frank always has played Schubert's final sonata supremely well, and you can forgive the occasionally uneven phrase or split note in light of the pianist's warm tone and intelligently shaped long lines, especially in the first-movement development section and throughout the slow movement. Frank's moderate tempo for the Scherzo allows the music its lilting, delicate due, while the finale boasts genuine cumulative urgency and a driving coda that ought to keep younger pianists humble.

The Mozart C major K. 330 sonata sports characterful grace, wit, and spot-on timing. Frank's bracing and direct treatment of the Mozart A minor Rondo demonstrates how to convey expressive niceties through color and nuance rather than by monkeying around with tempo. Likewise, the Schumann short pieces elicit eloquent, tellingly proportioned artistry.

By and large Frank plays the last three Beethoven sonatas with greater deliberation and lyricism than in his relatively faster RCA studio versions from nearly four decades earlier. The incisive punch and accentuation of yore has given way to more songful phrasing and room to breathe, although Frank's dynamic range ventures less toward Beethoven's extremes. This is a memorable release showcasing Claude Frank in authoritative performances of the music he loves best.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

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Claude Frank: 85th Birthday Celebration
Sono Luminus Nov 2010
CD
$21.99

Furtwangler: Symphony No. 2 / Jochum, Symphonieorchester Des Bayerischen Rundfunks

BR Klassik

$29.99 Nov 16, 2010

FURTWÄNGLER Symphony No. 2 • Eugen Jochum, cond; Bavarian RO • BR 900702 (2 monaural CDs: 82:54). Live: Munich 12/9–10/1954

One fact has been demonstrated to me as I did some research for this review: There is no logic whatsoever in pricing practices of the record industry. The major competition for this release is Daniel Barenboim’s Chicago Symphony Teldec recording (43495), which is also on two discs. Teldec U.S.A. priced it as two full discs—so on Amazon it sells for about $30, and on ArkivMusic for $34.99. However, on the British site MDT.uk.com its price for U.S. customers is listed as $18.50, because Teldec in Europe decided to price it as if it were one disc (which is rational, since it is just two minutes over the limit for one disc). On the other hand, this Bavarian Radio release seems to be treated in precisely the opposite manner: $26.77 is the U.S. price listed on MDT, but it is only $19.99 on ArkivMusic! You figure it out—I can’t!

Time for full disclosure: At the time of Barenboim’s recording (2001), I was managing the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and I played a role in persuading him to conduct the piece and him and Teldec to record it. Because of that I could not review it for Fanfare , but two reviewers did, in 26:2. Marc Mandel liked it very much but felt that Furtwängler’s own Vienna Philharmonic performance issued on Orfeo trumped Barenboim’s in the concluding section of the finale, where Mandel felt Barenboim let down just a bit. Martin Anderson expressed no reservations at all, in an unreservedly enthusiastic review.

Barenboim’s still remains the only readily available and enjoyable modern stereo recording. Alfred Walter’s Naxos effort is flabby beyond description, and one’s mind wanders halfway into the first movement, never to return. A performance by Georg Alexander Albrecht on Arte Nova is better, but not at the level of Barenboim or Furtwängler. Takashi Asahina’s fine Japanese recording from 1984 is just about impossible to obtain in the West (and may be so in Japan, too, for all I know). There are actually five (!) Furtwängler performances on disc, one a studio recording for DG, the other four all live readings. By far the best is the VPO on Orfeo (C365 941 B). It has good monaural 1950s broadcast sound, inspired playing, and of course the advocacy of the composer, who just happened to be one of the great conductors of the 20th century.

Both Barenboim and Furtwängler persuade one that this is an important, enjoyable score. As different writers have pointed out, there are elements of Bruckner, Strauss, Schmidt, Rachmaninoff, and probably others in its blood. It is old-fashioned for its time, to be sure, and it has its longeurs. But it is deeply moving, a work filled with some considerable anguish (much of it was written in Switzerland where Furtwängler had fled because he learned that he was on a Nazi assassination list, and where he was unable to conduct until he was cleared of Nazi affiliation charges by the Allies). It is also a work that doesn’t really sound like anyone else, despite having elements of many. In the end, one’s interest is maintained by the skillful orchestration and a strong element of melodic inspiration. For those interested in Furtwängler or in late-Romantic music, both Furtwängler’s and Barenboim’s recordings are valuable.

So where does this first-time issue of a 1954 broadcast fall? Right at the top level with those other two recordings. I reviewed the Furtwängler Orfeo release (a 1953 performance recorded in Vienna’s Musikvereinssaal) in the Classical Hall of Fame in Fanfare 18:5, and commented that it had some of the best recorded sound of any Furtwängler recording. That is true—but the Bavarian Radio folks were doing it even better in the middle 1950s, and what we have here is truly fine monaural recorded sound equal to many studio recordings being made at that time. It still of course cannot equal the sound quality of the Barenboim recording.

What distinguishes Jochum’s reading from the other two is his different approach to orchestral sonority and his tauter reading in general. Barenboim and Furtwängler both built their orchestral sound from the bottom up. Everything rested on a foundation of the basses and cellos, and, where appropriate, the lower brass. Jochum’s sound is brighter—it wouldn’t be fair to call it “top down,” but it is definitely a lighter sonority, with more emphasis on the upper strings and brass than is the case in the other two. What it lacks in lushness it compensates for with brighter colors. Add to that his extra dash of rhythmic snap, and you have a performance different enough to warrant exploration by anyone who loves this work. I would still not be without the composer’s own and the Barenboim, but I am very happy to have added this to my library. Renate Ulm’s very interesting and informative notes are an added plus.

FANFARE: Henry Fogel

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Furtwangler: Symphony No. 2 / Jochum, Symphonieorchester Des Bayerischen Rundfunks
BR Klassik Nov 2010
CD
$29.99

Songs of Connie Converse

Sono Luminus

$16.99 Oct 16, 2026

Evelyn Converse (Connie's mother): Is it sweet little ditties or is it modernistic? Connie Converse: It's got everything in it. I'm the one in the smoky gray button-down, gently disentombing a viola from it's case in the gauzy, late morning light illuminating this inviting Northcenter studio. In the freelance Classical (and Classical-adjacent) world, projects and their attendant rehearsals encompass the vibes and caliber spectrum, but managing the contents of one's tear ducts is not generally a required qualification. Maybe you can try to get word to the violist, currently encamping himself and his stand beneath a towering harp. That unwitting sap-the one who at this moment only knows that the pieces he's playing were originally penned by someone with an enticingly alliterative moniker-has no idea that this music is about to occupy a good deal of the rent-free space available in his head and heart long after the live broadcast, the 'gig,' wraps. It is, I'm afraid, a decidedly common reaction to an oeuvre of unquestionably uncommon music for those that encounter it some seventy-plus years since it was meticulously penned. Whether this is your first orbit or you already count yourself amongst the members of the How Sad, How Lovely devout-Connie's modest and also astonishing kitchen table recordings, most recently reissued by her fellow Michiganders Third Man Records-the sounds currently spinning through your synapses here offer an entirely unique perspective of an artist who not only scooped Dylan on coaxing folk music from the universal to the personal by a literal decade, but indeed ventured into a territory of art song he will never quite access. Her Only Light is a more dimensional, more expansive view of Connie Converse, a composer-performer-pacifist-scholar-activist who, like the story of her enigmatic departure, deserves a telling beyond an easy headline. Some orientation is necessary, though. Elizabeth Eaton Converse was valedictorian of her high school, a scholarship recipient at Mount Holyoke College, a songwriting hopeful in Harlem, and the Co-Editor of the Journal of Conflict Resolution (Center for Research on Conflict Resolution) at the University of Michigan. Was she, as is editorialized about so many of my favorite creators, maybe a little too smart to be happy? A more accurate assessment arrives by way of her nephew Tim Converse, who generously shared with me, 'I think that she saw so clearly the way things should be that she was constantly disappointed by how things actually were.' This was certainly the case regarding her years in New York, having absconded early from Mount Holyoke to pursue her songwriting and singing aspirations. Consider that the 1950's Greenwich Village folk revival-in full swing as she composed-for all it's posturing about political revolution and working-class authenticity, was structurally about as progressive as a debutante ball. Add to that the fact the (then) recording industry's almost unshakable insistence on genre conformity and, in the case of female performers, sexual magnetism, and it doesn't take much to understand how a path-carving artist more engrossed in her compositional brilliance than her appearance failed to break through to the monoculture. Though history is of course littered with unrecognized genius, this was actually not precisely the case for Converse. She was featured on CBS's The Morning Show hosted by no less than Walter Cronkite, and was championed by animator Gene Dietch who, in addition to her own efforts, we have to thank for the recordings found on How Sad, How Lovely. At this inflection point, when she seemed poised to, well, make it, Connie Converse pivoted her writing toward a far less marketable but perhaps more adventurous corner of musicmaking: 'art song.' If Connie's 'Guitar Songs' (singer-songwriter, folk-oriented) were slow to gain traction, what hopes could her 'Piano Songs' (art song, harmonically enterprising) possibly have in such an inhospitable industry? Jesus. We're halfway through these liner notes and I haven't even introduced you to the two remarkable interpreters of said songs-the thoughtful Converse evangelists behind Her Only Light: arranger Ronnie Kuller and vocalist Emmy Bean. Almost immediately in that aforementioned rehearsal, which I should clarify was in service of a live performance on WFMT after this album was mixed and mastered, I was scheming how I might stay in proximity to Ronnie's dextrous, insightful writing and Emmy's lustrous, utterly persuasive phrasing in the years to come. Like so many generative collaborations, theirs originated in an abiding desire for connection and a fascination with the sublime. It was also a creative lifeboat in the not-so-distant era of prolonged home confinement. Sparked by Bean's sharing the 2015 Anna and Elizabeth cover of 'Father Neptune'-the harmonizing of which would provide inspiration for the arrangement here-with Kuller (who had already taken Converse's music up on stage while in residence at beloved Chicago venue The Hideout) the latter describes her decision-making process with unguarded enthusiasm: 'I want a harp. I want two clarinets at the same time. I want a string section! I want Emmy Bean to sing to me!' Ronnie goes on to share what I consider an essential reason why Her Only Light is so riveting and unmissable: 'When Emmy is singing, I believe every word.' Given that Connie is often credited with originating the singer-songwriter genre, one in which vulnerability evaporates any dramatic or emotional partition between singer and lyric, Converse's songs can only truly thrive when delivered with such tender veracity. As the duo explored Converse's art songs, transcribed by Kuller from the hand-written original scores, the desire for immersion in and dispersion of these songs only deepened. Emmy describes her 'forever memory' like this: 'Once we got started on the art songs we began with 'Song for Old Wars,' and I remember singing it for the first time in a big cavernous room on an old piano. This was a few weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Hearing the final cadence of that song echo in the room-the "horns"-was incredible. It gave me something to honor in all the chaos of new/old wars; I felt like Connie was with us, grieving the losses.' The other partition in need of a wrecking ball-one of primary importance to both singer and arranger-was that of folk song vs. Art song. Not only is this boundary a fanciful one perpetrated by hierarchically-minded (i.e. misled or confused) listeners and record industry execs originating from preconceptions about formal education, 'rigor,' and, to get right down to it, vibratoin the context of Connie Converse it results from the reality that her art songs, the 'Piano Songs,' never made it on tape during her own and Dietch's kitchen recording sessions. They were written later, and composed for voices other than her own, sometimes soprano, sometimes baritone. Emmy found herself slipping into Connie's world without friction, but decisions on how to stylistically inhabit the 'Guitar' and 'Piano' songs only revealed itself once the project was at full tilt: 'I was surprised to find how Connie's songs invite another singer into them. Some songs belong so intimately to their writer's voice (especially folk singers or singer-songwriters) that it feels wrong to sing them or hear them sung by others. When I took on this project, I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to find the access point, that I wouldn't be able to inhabit them, that I would find myself mimicking her or struggling to find myself in them. But the craft that Connie put into her art songs-the 'Cassandra Cycle,' 'anyone lived in a pretty how town,' etc-is also there in the songs she wrote on guitar. They are no less solid, no less fully realized than the ones she wrote on piano. They completely stand on their own, and they welcome any singer with the imagination and humility to hear them and be with them. The reward of singing them is to be inside of Connie's mind for a moment, to feel such great joy and such deep empathy, and to be able to smile at things that are so, so sad. I was also struggling to figure out how Connie's guitar songs and piano songs would exist together on the same record, in the same voice (mine). It wasn't until we got into the studio that Ronnie and I figured out that I could be the same singer throughout; there was no need to over-stylize the art songs or under-sing the folk songs. Together we were able to find an approach that honored the depth of her writing in both contexts, and that kind of broke the spell of genre over the whole thing.' As you traverse these Guitar Songs- 'Talkin Like You (Two Tall Mountains)' 'I Have Considered the Lillies' 'Father Neptune' 'One by One' and these Piano Songs- 'Vanity of the Vanities' 'The Rainmaker' 'Incommunicado' 'anyone lived in a pretty how town' (text by e.e. cummings) 'The Age of Noon' The Cassandra Cycle (excerpted) 'Cassandra's Entrance' 'Song for Old Wars' 'She Thinks of Heaven' 'She Devises a Lullaby' -relish as I do, if you will, Ronnie Kuller's orchestrational witticisms and delights, as with her leitmotif approach to 'Talkin Like You (Two Tall Mountains),' here and elsewhere gracious without unnecessary reverence or over-caution. Be carried off by Emmy Bean's sumptuous and entrancing delivery of 'Father Neptune,' but don't miss the cheeky wink in her voice as she alights on the song's more eyebrow-raising lines ('And it's still his creed that he has no need of a wifeexcept on shore'). Perhaps you're familiar with the melancholy pervasive in Converse's tunes, but her humor is equally nimble. And of course, don't disembark before you experience 'One by One,' the song currently making the hapless gigger unprofessionally bleary-eyed in the middle of a rehearsal. Loneliness has found it's most crystalline, most desolate voice in these verses, and to these ears at least, it is a one-of-one. That quote at the top of the page? It arrives by way of a recorded conversation between Connie and her mother concerning an in-processopera! This heroine of songwriting contained multitudes-a conclusion you are funneling toward as you make your way through this enchanting tracklist-and with Her Only Light, we are finally provided Connie Converse in full, resplendent resolution. -Doyle Armbrust

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Songs of Connie Converse
Sono Luminus Oct 2026
CD
$16.99

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No 5, Triple Concerto / Fleisher

Sony Masterworks

$17.99 Oct 27, 2009

I didn't at all take to Fleisher's account of Beethoven No. 3, but I must say that this is a most impressive and exciting account of the Emperor, aided and abetted by a wonderful accompaniment from Szell and his orchestra—and, I mustn't forget, by a most intelligently balanced recording.

Fleisher plays the first movement with splendid brio and the dash with which he gives out the opening flourishes is equalled by the orchestra's attack and energy when it starts the tutti. In one passage of brilliant semiquavers he tends to hurry very slightly, both times it comes, but in general his rhythm is excellent. There are, too, passages of most lovely liquid playing, a kind of brush of quiet sound, beautiful not only as sound but admirable in that they let woodwind solos come through without any forcing by the players. Fleisher is obviously always aware of what's going on in the orchestra and knows when he should be taking part in chamber music, rather than always holding the front of the stage. He does indulge in a wide range of speeds but not, I suppose, more than is usually done. The slow movement is played simply by both soloist and orchestra, as it should be— yet it's a difficult thing to play something so apparently simply but make it as moving as it is here.

At the very end of the movement (bar 80) you may be surprised to hear the strings play a long crotchet, arco, instead of the pizzicato to which we are all so used (which starts only at the last quaver of the bar). I asked Denis Matthews (always a mine of Beethoven information) about this and he told me he had played the concerto with Szell and was quite astonished at rehearsal when the expected 'plonk' from the strings didn't happen. Szell told him that Beethoven's autograph has the `pizz' written over the rests in the middle of the bar: and I now see that the preface in the Eulenburg miniature score states the same thing (despite which, the word is printed at the start of the bar!). This is not a trivial point, for it occurs, of course, at just about the most magical moment of the whole concerto and I do think that the long, grave, B flat from the strings is far more apt than the rather disturbing 'plonk' which emphasizes Beethoven's change from B to B flat in the wrong way.

The finale goes splendidly all through and I only don't like Fleisher's mannered playing of part of the main theme each time. I refer to the bars marked espressivo, which would appear to suggest something other than his jerky delivery of the right hand phrases. But this is a small point and there is no doubt that this is the sort of performance that will make you enjoy the music afresh, for the playing all through the concerto is both zestful and perceptive; Szell's contribution is an added source of pleasure—and the admirable engineering complements the players' artistry.

-- Gramophone [1/1966, reviewing the original LP release of the Emperor Concerto]

------------------------------

The apologies invariably made for Beethoven's Triple Concerto seem to have an effect on performances. I have rarely, if ever, known one which did not in some respect carry an apology with it, and I have rarely, if ever, known one which treated the work in the strong bravura way which makes for success in the Emperor or violin concertos. But here is just such a performance, and it makes one glory in what Beethoven did achieve in the work.

The scale of the work as conceived by Stern, Rose and Istomin is quite different from that of the rival performances on record, however enjoyable. The precision and stylishness of Schneiderhan, Fournier and Anda on DGG make for an eighteenthcentury manner in the outer movements, particularly the first. Some may well continue to prefer it, and technically the balance with the orchestra is better than on the new CBS disc, but the newly roused echoes of other Beethoven concertos place the Stern/ Rose/Istomin performance in the right period. It is after all a produce of the Fidelio years, the years which also produced the Fourth Piano Concerto, the Violin Concerto and the Symphonies Nos. 4 to 6. It is possible to regard the formalism of the outer movements, their conscientious balance of thematic statements by each of the three soloists in turn, as a return to eighteenth-century practice, but the sheer size speaks rather of a really grand manner. And if the thematic material is more bald and less striking than that in other Beethoven concertos (at least in the first movement) there was a practical need with three soloists to keep ideas short.

In achieving a sense of size Stern, Rose and Istomin reveal their own stature in the relaxation of the playing. Lesser players would either screw up the tension or become ponderous, but these three over and over again convey the joy of their playing: the relaxed lilt of the second subject, Rose's natural warmth in the slow movement enunciation, the whole of the final Rondo Polacca. Not only has the main Polacca theme tremendous verve, the middle episode, when the `yatta-tah-ta-tah-ta' rhythm emerges on horn and lower woodwind, has a unique tang of East European music. Stern obviously takes the idea of a Polacca literally and exaggerates the first beat in each dactyllic phrase, giving a real bounce to the music, and he is matched by his colleagues.

Then the semiquaver allegro reprise of the main theme towards the end is taken very fast and very clear, the result extraordinarily exciting. You have only to compare the DGG performance, very fast too and excellent in its way, to realize why Stern's, Rose's and Istomin's playing is not merely vital but great. Equally exciting are the furious florid dialogues between violin and 'cello in the passage-work of first and last movements. All three soloists are masterly in varying the tension, in shaping towards climaxes, and Ormandy draws from the Philadelphia Orchestra yet another of his really full-blooded accompaniments. In relation to the soloists the orchestra may seem a little backward, but the salient tuttis burst out with great effect, to match the scale of the soloists' playing. The nearness of the soloists does of course make it hard for them to sound as though they are playing really softly, and initial sotto voce entries in the finale are too loud.

In my detailed comparisons I have occasionally found points in which rivals score over Stern, Rose and Istomin, and the other CBS version has Serkin in marvellous form actually dominating the performance from the least prominent solo part, the non-virtuoso piano role originally devised for the Archduke Rudolf. But no minor shortcomings can alter the positive merits of what could well come to be regarded as a classic record.

-- Gramophone [10/1965, reviewing the original LP release of the Triple Concerto]

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Beethoven: Piano Concerto No 5, Triple Concerto / Fleisher
Sony Masterworks Oct 2009
CD
$17.99

Brahms: String Quartets Nos. 1 & 2 / New Zealand String Quartet

Naxos

$19.99 Jul 08, 2016

Successful string quartet performance is all about communication, in the purest sense of the word: constant giving and exchanging, a communion among the players based on an intimate relationship bound by deep understanding, of the music and of each other. It’s the essence of what is meant by ensemble. When you have that, you can play anything together and make it vital, and most of all, true to the composer’s intent.

As my colleague David Hurwitz said in an earlier review, Brahms’ quartets are “respected more than they are loved”, and can sound “overworked” and “texturally monotonous”. It’s true that you can play unlawfully fast and loose with these quartets and pretty much get away with it, given enough rhythmic finesse and blurring of textures, and these are among the many reasons that listeners, including me, usually aren’t that much in love with these dense, phenomenally busy, complicated pieces. But when you hear them played with the unusual clarity, scintillating detail, and dynamic, exacting, turn-on-a-dime expressive statements uttered by an ensemble of literally one interpretive mind and unassailable technique, you have to rethink the reasons for your avoidance reflex when faced with a Brahms quartet close encounter.

When the New Zealand Quartet made this recording its members had been working and playing together for 20 years, a rarity in the music world, and a situation that pays huge dividends in performance. There are few relationships anywhere in which the members spend more time together, pouring heart and soul into an intensely charged, creative collaboration, its success built both on individual artistic drive and vision, and contingent on compromising, blending, and capitalizing on the strengths of those impulses and passions. Any group that can manage this, whether a married couple or a string quartet, is something of a miracle, and, especially if you’ve seen this group in concert, you know how special it is.

And there is no holding back in these performances: the NZSQ literally attacks and wrestles Brahms’ scores to the ground–a positive, friendly intervention, for the good of all concerned. These performances should not disappoint any listener, whether you hate Brahms or love his music, because they take you out of the realm of preconception and just deliver aggressive, uninhibited, and yes, passionate expressions of these scores, respectful of the composer while always working to realize the fullness of the music that Brahms struggled so long and hard to create.

My only regret here is that with a recording you don’t truly experience what this group is doing. Unless you actually see them in concert, you don’t appreciate the incredible group dynamic that’s happening during a performance, you don’t totally get the ensemble interaction that produces this result. They stand when they perform–cellist Rolf Gjelsten sits on a special raised platform–and there’s a physicality to the communication among the players that’s only comparable to a dance, a ballet. And if you can make a ballet out of Brahms’ string quartets, well, you’ve got something that’s worth listening to.

– ClassicsToday (David Vernier)

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Brahms: String Quartets Nos. 1 & 2 / New Zealand String Quartet
Naxos Jul 2016
CD
$19.99

Haydn: Keyboard Sonatas / Vladimir Feltsman

Nimbus

$16.99 Jul 01, 2013

Vladimir Feltsman has a long-established reputation as a major artist. His 1987 arrival in the United States (after a seven-year shutdown of his career by Soviet authorities) was greeted with loud huzzahs. His first American recital took place at the White House, and his ensuing Carnegie Hall debut was recorded in its entirety. His repertoire covers everything from Bach through the 20th century. Recording first for Melodiya, then for Sony, then Camerata, he has now made a great many recordings for Nimbus since 2008.

These seem to be Feltsman’s first recordings of Haydn; his readings are very personal, as if he were trying to be different from every other performance or recording. There are many unmarked and unexpected tempo changes, some amounting to Luftpausen more appropriate to mid-19th-century music. Such playing can be either invigorating in its freshness or cloying in its fussiness; it would no doubt upset period practice purists. As a long-time lover of conductor Willem Mengelberg’s erratic ways, I would expect to be open to Feltsman’s performances, but I can be invigorated and exasperated by the same passage on succeeding days. I am bothered by Feltsman’s wildly inconsistent playing of the C-Minor Sonata, but maybe that’s just me: I have never been satisfied with any performance and am not even sure what I want from this often recorded piece. The only pianist to come close is Youri Egorov, yet I cannot cite anything special in his recording; he just plays it straight, offering no special insight.

I listen again as I write this, and I continue to be disturbed by the dichotomy: Such magnificent pianism takes the breath away, yet such inappropriate music-making almost loses Haydn. Then comes the opening Presto of the E-Minor Sonata: Feltsman understands well that the vibrancy of a Presto is never based on speed alone. Every mark in the score is faithfully observed, the clarity and sheer life of the playing are inimitable; there is only one slight slowdown at an internal cadence, and a thrilling virtuoso flourish—lasting less than a second—is tossed into the second repeat. I could keep, and recommend, this two-CD set for this one track. But the following Adagio is filled with bluster and virtuoso posturing (in his program notes, Feltsman calls it “elaborate ornamentation in the manner of C.P.E. Bach.”), and the final Vivace molto wanders fitfully, searching in vain for its true character. So it goes throughout both discs. Listening again to the C-Minor Sonata, Feltsman produces a lovely, yearning character in the opening measures, but after a minute or so his odd phrasings, unexpected pauses, and sudden violent attacks spoil the mood.

The opening Andante con espressione of the C-Major Sonata is fascinating here. Feltsman’s left hand is leonine, like nothing since Cliburn. But a cutesy twist of the three chords in measure nine breaks the spell before it has a chance settle in. In the Presto , there is an awkward moment during the repeat of measure 17 (at 0:37) that sounds like a too-tight edit, cutting a fraction of a second from the music. Nimbus’s trademark reverberance is too much for this tempo, blurring what seems to be pristine pianism. The Eb Variations are gentle, subtle music, and Feltsman has a strong feeling for them. There is not a single virtuoso excess in its 17 minutes.

It’s clear that Feltsman can do anything he wants at the keyboard, and do it better than almost anyone else. One constantly receives the impression that one is listening to a dominant artist. But his style of playing generally does not suit Haydn—Sviatoslav Richter could get away with it because he was so sensitive to every type of music. It works on and off for Feltsman. I equate his playing with Nimbus’s recorded sound: both are brilliant but overdone, too glittering, too shiny. Has any piano ever sounded this bright, with a tiny halo around every note? The results are not for me, but that doesn’t mean they may not be for you. What I do recommend is that every piano lover hear these performances.

Postscript : The package is a single-CD-sized jewel case, but the swinging inner tray fell out every time I opened it. It’s long past time to abandon the fragile jewel case.

FANFARE: James H. North

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Haydn: Keyboard Sonatas / Vladimir Feltsman
Nimbus Jul 2013
CD
$16.99

Eduard Franck: Piano Trios

Audite Musikproduktion

$20.99 Mar 25, 2014

E. FRANCK Piano Trios: in E; in Eb, op. 22; in D, op. 53 • Swiss Pn Tr • AUDITE 97690 (74:21)

By now, readers should be somewhat familiar with Eduard Franck (1817–1893), following half-a-dozen or so appearances he has made here on recordings mainly of his chamber works. The Audite label, in particular, though not exclusively, has taken up the dual causes of Eduard and his son Richard with 15 or so discs devoted in large part to the two composers’ chamber music output; and, being the compulsive collector of 19th-century chamber music that I am, I’m proud to say I’ve acquired every last one of them. But there’s more to Eduard Franck than quartets, quintets, sextets, trios, and duo sonatas; among Audite’s offerings have been two violin concertos, a disc of concert overtures, and two symphonies.

This latest release, containing three of Eduard’s piano trios, holds no surprises if you’ve already acquainted yourself with one or another previous Eduard Franck release, but like those that have preceded it, this disc of piano trios does hold in store just as many musical felicities.

I use the word “felicity” with intent; for Eduard studied privately with the “Felix” of Mendelssohn fame, and mostly Mendelssohn is what you get with these three trios. It’s really hard to describe how brimming over this music is with sheer contentment in untroubled, joyful song. The nonstop rippling piano parts are shot through with Mendelssohn’s nimble keyboard work, and even Franck’s melodies are consistently constructed from intervals and phrases that are dead ringers for Mendelssohn’s melodic invention. If you find Felix’s two piano trios irresistible, you will be thrilled to know that Eduard Franck composed at least four piano trios just like them.

In fact, this is Audite’s second volume of Franck’s piano trios. The first (92567), on SACD, contained the trios in E Minor, op. 11, and D Major, op. 58, performed by a different ensemble of players than the Swiss Piano Trio on the current disc, which, for some reason, did not come to me on SACD. Also, be aware that if you purchased the Naxos CD containing Franck’s sonatas for cello and violin, plus the Eb-Major Piano Trio I recommended in 36:5, the trio is duplicated on this Audite disc. No matter, though; it’s worth the one duplication to get the two additional trios included on the present CD.

This is now my third or fourth encounter with the Swiss Piano Trio on record, and each one has elicited from me the highest praise. The ensemble’s recent Audite release on SACD of Clara Schumann’s Piano Trio led me to declare the Swiss Piano Trio one of the top ensembles on today’s stage in 36:6; and in a 35:1 review of Robert Schumann’s piano trios, Steven Ritter declared the Swiss Piano Trio’s Audite SACD an essential recording.

It seems only fitting that the Swiss Piano Trio, having already committed Mendelssohn’s two piano trios to disc on another Audite SACD—to which I gave an urgent recommendation in 34: 6—should now turn its attention to Mendelssohn’s musical doppelgänger , Eduard Franck. You cannot love 19th-century piano trios in general, and Mendelssohn’s piano trios in particular, and not love these trios by Franck. Considering Franck’s dates, the skewing of his catalog towards chamber works (though he did pen symphonies and orchestral scores), and his strong leaning towards a Mendelssohnian style, he bears comparison, I think, to his very close “French-though-I-prefer-to-be-German” contemporary, Theodor Gouvy (1819–1898).

I just don’t understand why previous Audite releases have been SACDs and this one isn’t. Perhaps there is a parallel SACD version, and I just happened to receive the standard two-channel stereo CD one. Anyway, with the music, performances, and recording being so beguiling, it would be churlish of me to complain. This is a must-buy recommendation.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Eduard Franck: Piano Trios
Audite Musikproduktion Mar 2014
CD
$20.99

Feldman, Babbitt: Clarinet Quintets / Mark Lieb, Et Al

Innova Recordings

$16.99 Jan 26, 2010

FELDMAN Clarinet and String Quartet. BABBITT Clarinet Quintet • Mark Lieb (cl); Phoenix Ensemble • INNOVA 746 (62:35)

By reputation, such ideologically distinct composers would seem to be an awkward pairing as discmates—Morton Feldman’s abstract expressionist-influenced, intuitive, repetitively detailed formal design versus Milton Babbitt’s mathematically abstracted, reason-induced, labyrinthine methodology—and yet the individual virtues of each seem to emphasize and illuminate the dramatic character of the other. The contrast between these two works is both revealing and satisfying.

Feldman’s Clarinet and String Quartet (1983) is constructed around repeated, subtly altered, and juxtaposed melodic and textural patterns; the music’s progress is like a stationary view of a single shape (the combined colors and often divided attacks of the clarinet and strings) until it is replaced by a new shape, so there is continual forward motion, but not conventional rhythmic momentum. The effect is not passive, but intently active—the melodic outline expands and contracts, as natural as breathing—circumscribing an emotional voice that is muted, but nevertheless capable of suggesting moments of sadness, inquisitiveness, mystery, and fascination.

Though linked together seamlessly, the patterns of Feldman’s compositional design are on display continuously, so the structure is transparently audible. On the other hand, Babbitt’s Quintet for Clarinet and String Quartet (1996) is swept along on an animated elaboration of melody, and the internal complexity of its form is of no concern. Details drive the music forward—twisting clarinet contours, contrapuntal string maneuvers, an unexpected sequence of pizzicato, sudden dynamic displacements, impulsive bursts of energy. The quintet’s extended linear development is in some ways reminiscent of Babbitt’s teacher, Roger Sessions, and what Sessions derived from Schoenberg, but given added oomph by the verve and scintillation of Babbitt’s wit.

Clarinetist Mark Lieb and his cohorts do a brilliant job in capturing the specific character of such radically different pieces of music. The Babbitt, by the way, receives its premiere recording—one wonders why such an exhilarating piece was neglected for so long. Highly recommended.

FANFARE: Art Lange

Those familiar with Morton Feldman’s music will know what to expect from his Clarinet Quintet: austere minimalist textures, rigorous logical structuring, detached but sonorous consonant chords, repeating but continually set off-kilter by asymmetric time signatures. They might be more surprised by the fact that there is room on the CD for another work, and that the work in question is by Milton Babbitt, a composer at the maximalist end of the American new music spectrum.

In fact, the pairing works very well. The Feldman work is far from ambient and requires the same kind of focused attention that listeners would expect to pay to Babbitt. The Feldman is process music to a degree, yet the processes are regularly subjected to human intervention. Motifs are introduced by, for example, scoring a bar of 5/4 as an accumulating chord, one instrument starting the bar, the next entering on the second beat, and so on until the final note is a chord made up of the motif. It’s a neat way of marrying harmony and melody, and it is far from the only textural device in the work, but all the others are of a similar level of simplicity. The clarinet stands out from the strings although less than you might expect: more of a guiding voice through the textures than a true soloist. Mark Lieb stresses the simplicity of the line in his clarinet playing. His stamina and evenness of tone are remarkable assets here. The work is currently available on two other commercial recordings, one in the Feldman Edition on the Mode label (Mode 119) with clarinettist Carol Robinson, the other on Metier with Roger Heaton (MSV 92082). This recording has the edge over both, thanks to the performance and the sound. Much of the music is at a very low dynamic, and the precision of the recording allows each of the detached, attenuated sounds to appear with the utmost clarity, and from a crystalline silence. Similarly, the disciplined precision of the string quartet is fully attuned to Feldman’s stern aesthetic. The few articulations that he indicates are never exaggerated to the point of disturbing his uneasy, but ultimately unbroken, continuum.

Milton Babbitt’s Quintet for Clarinet and String Quartet is another extended single span of music: a paradoxical combination of expansive form and minutely detailed construction. But much about Milton Babbitt is paradoxical, not least the fact that his career at the cutting edge of serialist Modernism grew out of jazzy and folky roots. According to the liner-notes - and this was news to me - jazz and popular song have always been a part of the composer’s musical psyche. In his early days, he even wrote a Broadway musical entitled Fabulous Voyage. Less surprisingly, Broadway wasn’t interested. The Quintet dates from 1995-6, the far end of the composer’s career, but the jazzy rhythms on the clarinet are an important part of its musical identity. Alex Ross wrote of the work when he heard its premiere that it was ‘a delight to the senses, a fast flow of lovely chords and spry rhythms, a thing of sweetness and light.’ I’m not prepared to go quite that far, but the combination of lively rhythms and widely-spaced chordal textures gives the work a feeling of openness that is often absent from the composer’s more mathematical constructions. The counterpoint is very much in the serialist mould, with spaces in the texture appearing through the seemingly arbitrary and coincidental absences of notes in the individual parts.

If I were to describe the work as an indicator of the composer mellowing with age, it would be with the proviso that even Babbitt’s take on mellowness will seem violently aggressive to most listeners. But it is a rewarding listen, the composer’s ear for timbral and harmonic - or at least vertical - detail shines through in every bar. And there are surprises along the way, continually nudging the listener out of any sense of complacency at having fully digested a texture or contrapuntal construction. As with the Feldman, the formidable difficulties are expertly handled by the ensemble, which is fully attuned to Babbitt’s musical methods, and whose performance here is apparently endorsed by the composer. This is the first commercial recording of the work, and should serve as an excellent benchmark for future performers.

-- Gavin Dixon, MusicWeb International

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Feldman, Babbitt: Clarinet Quintets / Mark Lieb, Et Al
Innova Recordings Jan 2010
CD
$16.99

Brahms: Symphony No 2, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO

Naxos

$19.99 Oct 11, 2005

An invigorating and very enjoyable reading of this fine symphony.

This is the second instalment in Marin Alsop’s ongoing Brahms cycle. Both its predecessor and this latest offering have been widely praised by colleagues. I’ve heard her both on radio and on disc in twentieth century repertoire but I’d yet to encounter her in "standard" repertoire so I was curious to hear her in Brahms and especially in what has long been my favourite of the four symphonies.

She immediately scores high marks with me for taking the exposition repeat in the first movement. This is not so often done. I can understand why conductors omit the repeat for there is an issue of structural balance. Taking the repeat elongates the first movement by some five minutes - in this performance - and thereby means that, in Ms Alsop’s hands, the first movement accounts for 20:05 of the 44:51 that she takes for the whole symphony. So there is a danger of imbalance but I must say I didn’t feel that this particular reading was unbalanced and, in any case, why wouldn’t one wish to hear such wonderful music twice? Also, omitting the repeat means that the first time bars must be left out and that’s a pity since the music they contain is well worth hearing, as Ms Alsop demonstrates.

In his good liner-note Robert Pascall rightly draws attention to the dark side of this movement. The Second is conventionally regarded as Brahms’s sunniest symphony and many conductors focus on that side rather than the darker element, which is mainly to be found in the development section. Marin Alsop, it seems to me, is one such and I don’t find that her interpretation brings out the dark side of the music. That’s not to disparage her reading in any way. A "sunny" approach is perfectly valid and, in any case, even if you appreciate a performance that hints at deeper waters, as I do, you may not want to hear such a reading every day. A couple of years ago, for example, I reviewed what I thought was an exceptionally unsettling account of this movement by Furtwängler. Tremendously impressive though that was, it wouldn’t do for everyday listening. No, it seems to me that Marin Alsop gives us a well-imagined and highly enjoyable rendition of this movement, one which is built on rhythmic vitality, warm phrasing and excellent attention to dynamics.

Ms. Alsop judges the start of the second movement beautifully, encouraging the celli to sing out. Later there’s excellent work by the LPO’s principal horn and, indeed, this is matched by the other wind soloists. Ms. Alsop clearly loves this music and under her guidance the strings phrase generously. She pays great attention to sustaining the musical line and this I like very much. In the central section of the movement there’s just the right amount of powerful projection before the return of the warm lyricism that characterised the opening paragraphs.

There’s some nice, pert wind playing at the start of the Allegretto and later the strings match their wind colleagues in agility. This movement is a fairly brief interlude in the overall scheme of things, a bit of a musical sorbet in fact. Here it receives a fresh and engaging reading.

Ms. Alsop catches well the mood of suppressed energy at the start of the finale. Once Brahms increases the volume she presses the music home splendidly, striking a balance between energy and lyricism that seems to me to be extremely well judged. The end of this ebullient movement is irresistibly jubilant here with the LPO brass, who have served their conductor well throughout the whole performance, well to the fore.

In summary, this is an invigorating and very enjoyable reading of this fine symphony. The LPO plays attentively and with commitment. On the evidence of this release, this Brahms cycle is not one that’s being made just for the sake of it but rather because Marin Alsop wanted to do it and has something definite to say about the music.

As a filler we’re offered eight of the Hungarian Dances, three of them in orchestrations by Brahms, the remainder in orchestral dress tailored for them by Dvo?ák. I have to confess that these pieces aren’t really my cup of tea but they are well done. In common with a lot of so-called light music these dances aren’t easy to do well. On this occasion the performances benefit from enthusiastic playing. Equally important is the fact that the dances are shaped affectionately by Marin Alsop, who displays a good, intuitive sense of rubato.

A most enjoyable disc which can be recommended confidently and enthusiastically.

-- John Quinn, MusicWeb International

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Brahms: Symphony No 2, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO
Naxos Oct 2005
CD
$19.99

Bellini: La Sonnambula / Benini, Siragusa, Gutierrez, Colecchia [blu-ray]

Dynamic

Blu-Ray

$36.99 Jul 30, 2013

BELLINI La sonnambula • Maurizio Benini, cond; Eglise Gutiérrez (Amina); Antonio Siragusa (Elvino); Simone Alaimo (Count Rodolfo); Sandra Pastrana (Lisa); Gabriella Colecchia (Teresa); Gabriele Nani (Alessio); Teatro Lirico di Cagliari O & Ch • DYNAMIC 55616 (Blu-ray: 141:00) Live: Cagliari 2008

For those of you who may hold the opinion that Vincenzo Bellini was rather a minor composer, you need to see and hear this opera, La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker), particularly the last 15 minutes or so. The music transcends the heavens, it surpasses anything written by Rossini, Donizetti, or even Verdi. Okay, I guess my enthusiasm is showing a bit, but I truly love this music, however it stacks up in the pantheon of consummate 19th-century Italian composers. The story is simple. The betrothed young village girl, Amina, is discovered in the bed of the local Count in his room at the village inn, he returning to his native environs for the first time in many years. Everyone is shocked, horrified, including the prospective groom, Elvino. Lisa, the young mistress of the inn, also smitten with Elvino, takes advantage to whisk the tenor hero away from his now disgraced intended. It turns out Amina sleepwalks, which the townsfolk and Elvino eventually discover, and after a ravishing double aria for the leading lady in the finale of act 2, all is set well again. The simple tale is charming and if you enjoy bel canto, it doesn’t get any better than this.

I was pleased to get this disc for review because I have been hearing the praises sung for young Cuban American coloratura Eglise Gutiérrez for a few years now, and have not had much opportunity to see or hear her. (She was the fairy godmother in Massenet’s Cendrillon, which I enjoyed, but that opera is hardly prime bel canto land.) I am here to report Gutiérrez is the real deal. Vocally she harkens back to the days of the true Bellini divas, to Giuditta Pasta and Maria Malibran. The young singer’s top range is incredible and solidly in place, everything is precisely on key, sung easily and cleanly. Vocal agility is excellent: Gutiérrez has not the slightest problem with Bellini’s pyrotechnics and she ornaments tastefully and often, like the best of bel canto songbirds. If her acting and stage presence are at times rather ordinary in this 2006 rendering, we should remember that La Sonnambula does not require the histrionics of a Tosca. The young soprano’s portrayal is very charming here, certainly a plus for the production.

Sets are kept simple and traditional, with rustic pastoral settings evoked by a grassy forestage and colorful painted backdrops. It is lovely to watch and far outshines its more famous Metropolitan Opera counterpart (to be seen again this April with Diana Damrau). The costumes, if anything, seem a bit too lavish and colorful for peasant wear, but sumptuous to the eye; I am not complaining. Staging is strictly traditional, as this little charmer of an opera almost necessarily requires. The visual realm is almost completely in service to the music here, and when La Sonnambula is performed in this fashion cannot fail to please even the most jaded opera goers.

Warning: now comes the caveat! Unfortunately, the tenor Elvino is disappointing. Antonio Siragusa sings well and with excellent pitch control, but has an annoying nasal vocal tone, especially when he pushes the voice, that quite spoils his part in the proceedings. It is something you can get used to when he sings alone, but next to the ravishing voice of Gutiérrez and the other fine voices on this set in duets and ensembles, it is continually noticeable and jarring. The Count Rodolfo is sung by veteran Simone Alaimo, who still brings plenty of rich baritone beauty to the role and just the right touch of innocent paternal concern for the beleaguered Amina. Another standout vocally is young Sandra Pastrana as Lisa, who also handles Bellini’s fioratura with delightful expertise and is a big asset to this production. Smaller roles are likewise filled with quite good singers, and the orchestra from the Teatro Lirico Cagliari gives us an impressive rendition of Bellini’s wonderful score. The chorus, a particularly integral part of La Sonnambula, also turns in a first-class performance. It really seems a shame to me that Gutiérrez could not have been paired with a tenor who could at least have gotten out of her way here, let alone the hopeless wish for a Juan Diego Flórez or Lawrence Brownlee in the role. If that had happened this would be a La Sonnambula for the ages; as it is, it’s still very good.

As is to be expected these days, the Dynamic Blu-ray is quite sharply detailed and in exceptionally vivid colors, with state of the art audio formats providing excellent sound. The only current Blu-ray competitor is a recent release to be found on the C Major label. I have not seen it, but soprano Jessica Pratt is also a rising young coloratura star and from what I have heard on YouTube, is very, very good as Amina. The tenor is also promising. Also worth your attention is the VAI DVD issue with Anna Moffo from 1956. Moffo doesn’t have a clue about bel canto style but her young voice is ravishing, the production charming, and she is very lovely to watch, even before her famous nose job. Check out what all the furor was about! The Mary Zimmerman-directed production from the Met has a great cast, but archly ridicules the original story while failing to make much sense itself. As for this disc, it could have been a world beater, but if you can get used to the nasal tenor, it is still very enjoyable. Recommended.

FANFARE: Bill White

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Bellini: La Sonnambula / Benini, Siragusa, Gutierrez, Colecchia [blu-ray]
Dynamic Jul 2013
Blu-Ray
$36.99

Reinecke: Complete Violoncello Sonatas / Manuel Fischer-dieskau, Connie Shih

MDG

$23.99 Sep 01, 2011

For British listeners, the name of Reinecke is likely to evoke Stanford’s recollection - after an uninspiring period of study with him - that “of all the dry musicians I have ever known, he was the most desiccated”. Scandinavians will remember that Grieg thought no better of the man and that for Svendsen, “not only is he envious and bloodless … he is also in the highest degree villainous”. Yet many musicians sought him out during his long reign at the Leipzig Gewandhaus (1860-1895), including Sullivan, Bruch, Delius and the three just mentioned, while Elgar travelled to Leipzig in 1882 to hear him conduct.

If this all suggests a plodding academic, the “Undine” Sonata for flute and piano, the one work by Reinecke that remains at least on the fringe of the repertoire, is neither academic nor lacking in fantasy. A disc containing the First Symphony, the Violin Concerto and some smaller pieces suggested to me that further examination of Reinecke would be never less than pleasant, if hardly thrilling. Maybe thrilling would be too strong a word for these cello sonatas too, but they do suggest he was more inspired in chamber music than in larger orchestral pieces.

In some ways the first sonata is the most attractive of all. Its ballad-like opening theme immediately catches the attention and the second theme is not only well contrasted, it is introduced in a very remote tonality indeed. What is striking about this movement is the mastery with which it combines free-flowing, rhapsodic feeling with tight formal control. Though Reinecke is said to have looked back to Mendelssohn and Schumann for his models, and certainly rejected Liszt and Wagner, his music combines romantic spirit with an intuitive sense of form. Here, at least, he was able to make his own personal fusion of classical ideals and romantic freedom. The second movement also contains a number of quite contrasting ideas and the finale has much surging passion.

The claims of the second sonata are not to be underestimated, either. After a short but brooding introduction the first movement leads off with a pithy, expressive idea that revolved in my head for some days afterwards. Again, Reinecke’s formal control is tight even while the effect is of free rhapsody. The themes tend not to appear and reappear in the expected places and tonalities, and are inclined to undergo transformations just where an exact recapitulation might seem in sight. The second movement is marked “Quasi fantasia” and has much soaring romantic melody. The finale starts with a catchy tune but is inclined to chase its own tail a bit too much for its own good. This, admittedly, is a common failing among 19^th century finales when not written by Brahms.

Altogether, it may be said that, if Reinecke did not revolutionize sonata forms, he nevertheless evolved an intuitively inventive way of reinterpreting received formal wisdom. The interesting thing is that exactly the same thing could be said about his grudging pupil Stanford’s chamber music, even down to a tendency to write finales that chase their own tail. One is bound to wonder if Reinecke’s music did not have a greater influence on Stanford than he later cared to admit, having been so disappointed by the man himself. Also common to both composers is a complete equality between the two partners, with plenty of challenging material for both players and a continual melodic interplay that must make Reinecke’s chamber music rewarding to perform. Ultimately, I suppose this music inhabits smiling valleys and pleasant domestic surroundings rather than soar above the mountain peaks, but we can surely find a place for music that does this so attractively.

The third sonata arouses more ambivalent reactions. Dedicated “to the shade of Brahms”, who had just died, its formal mastery will not be questioned. Furthermore, while in one sense it occupies harmonic ground solidly rooted in Schumann, its restless modulations look ahead to the world of Reger. It is a bitter, even vehement work by a composer whose art was by then left high and dry by musical progress. The only problem is that Reinecke’s easy flow of melodic inspiration seems to have dried up. The themes are clear-cut and functional, but neither the composer’s masterly development of them, nor these performers’ imagination and conviction, can hide the fact that the cupboard is a little bare. Only the second theme of the finale recalls the warmth of earlier years. Nevertheless, as often with late works by composers clinging to the style of their youth in the teeth of what they perceive as ugly modernism, the sense of isolation and disillusionment can be moving in themselves. Here, too, the case of Stanford is an obvious parallel.

Manuel Fischer-Dieskau, just in case you’ve been wondering, is the great baritone’s son. It would seem that interventionism, as an interpretative creed, runs in the family. But, like his father at his best, MF-D knows how to intervene in a way that brings the music to life, and he extracts the maximum range of expression from these scores. The Canadian pianist Connie Shih has an easy technical command and a well-rounded tone in the heavier moments. She and the cellist seem in full agreement over how to play this music. They leave me wondering why the first two sonatas, at least, never made it into the not very large repertoire of romantic cello sonatas.

Cellists reading these words may be wondering where they can get the scores. They will be delighted to find that the IMSLP-Petrucci Library, a great Internet resource, apparently offers all three for free download. They will be a bit less delighted when they find that the file of no.1 is missing pages 4-15, jumping from the first page of the first movement to the last page of the second, so you get only the finale complete. Also, there’s not a cello part, instead there’s an alternative violin part. The second sonata is complete but the piano part of no.3 lacks the last page, or maybe the last two. In compensation you get pages 10 and 11 twice. I used to think that people who do things for love not money do them properly, but on this showing even some who work for love are as slap-happy as any half-hearted employee anxious for the next coffee break. Granted, one shouldn’t look a gift-horse in the mouth, but we may reasonably check that it has all four legs.

None of this little grumble, obviously, affects the value of this finely recorded and excellently annotated disc of three cello sonatas well worth investigating. The name of Reinecke is beginning to come alive for me.

-- Christopher Howell, MusicWeb International

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Reinecke: Complete Violoncello Sonatas / Manuel Fischer-dieskau, Connie Shih
MDG Sep 2011
CD
$23.99

On Christmas Night / Nethsingha, Choir of St. John's

Chandos

SACD

$21.99 Oct 25, 2011

This excellent and most enjoyable disc will be a high quality Christmas present for a musical friend - or to give to yourself!

It’s four years now since Andrew Nethsingha moved from Gloucester Cathedral, where he had been a distinguished Director of Music, to St. John’s College, where as part of his training he had once been the Organ Scholar, under George Guest. Having established himself securely with the college’s choir he’s begun recording with them for Chandos and the partnership has already produced some impressive results. These include a very fine Howells collection, an equally good mixed recital of church music and a disc of music by Lassus, which I haven’t heard but which impressed my colleague, Gavin Dixon. Their latest offering is of music for Advent and Christmas; in every respect it maintains the high standards set by their previous releases.

Before commenting on the music, can I commend Chandos for the quality of the booklet? This label is always strong on documentation but there must be a temptation for record companies to economise a little on such releases - “it’s only carols”. In fact, Chandos provide all the texts and, best of all, a really useful and thorough essay by Martin Ennis, which includes a separate and interesting paragraph on every one of the twenty-four items on the programme. The essay, in fact, is a model of its kind and the best I can recall seeing for a release of seasonal music.

The programme has been very carefully chosen and includes a welcome mix of the familiar, the unfamiliar and the familiar in slightly less-than-familiar guise. Into this latter category would come items such as the exuberant and effective arrangement by Philip Marshall, the former organist of Lincoln Cathedral, of I saw three ships. The version of Ding! dong! merrily on high would also fall into the exuberant, indeed flamboyant, category. It was made by the Music Director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and requires two organists. The organ features strongly - and most effectively - in Stephen Jackson’s arrangement of Noël nouvelet. Indeed, the organ writing is a key element in giving the setting its pronounced French flavour. It’s good to see Andrew Nethsingha give a bow to one of his predecessors at St. John’s, Christopher Robinson. Instead of the usual - and excellent - Willcocks descant to Hark! the herald angels sing we hear Robinson’s descant and a jolly good one it is!

Moving to the unfamiliar elements in the programme we find Christopher Robinson there too. I’d not heard before his setting of Make we joy - a text more famously set by Walton. I like this Robinson setting very much indeed; it’s buoyant and strongly rhythmic. Also new to me was Michael Finnissy’s Telling. Written in 2008, this is a setting for unaccompanied choir of an anonymous sixteenth century text. Martin Ennis draws attention, rightly, to the “refined harmonic sensibility” of the piece. I think it’s a beautiful composition and, in an intelligent piece of programme ordering, we find that Kenneth Leighton’s fine Coventry Carol, which comes next in the running order, complements the Finnissy nicely. Mention should also be made of Matthew Martin’s Adam lay ybounden. This is very different from some other settings - one thinks of Boris Ord’s celebrated setting, for starters. Martin’s piece is slow and reflective and it’s good to have another slant on this well-known text. I also liked the item by James Burton, perhaps best known as Director of the Oxford Schola Cantorum. His Balulalow eschews trebles - the altos take the top line - giving an interesting, darker texture. Some of the harmonies are quite close and I think it’s a lovely piece.

And so to the familiar seasonal items. It’s right to include them to give the programme balance. Nethsingha and his singers pay these pieces - and their listeners - the important compliment of taking as much care over them as they have done over the less conventional fare. Harold Darke’s classic piece is given a lovely performance and lovely too is the choir’s account of Philip Ledger’s sympathetic arrangement of Silent Night - good planning, too, to place this immediately after his equally good arrangement of the Sussex Carol. Ledger’s predecessor at King’s College, Sir David Willcocks, is represented by his justly popular Tomorrow shall be my dancing day. O little town of Bethlehem, mainstay of innumerable carol services, makes an equally welcome appearance. It wouldn’t be a Christmas programme without John Rutter. When you hear his lovely What sweeter music, which, as Martin Ennis justly observes, contains “one of his most winning melodies”, you realise just why for so many people Rutter has become synonymous with Christmas music. The present performance is first class, with every little detail of Rutter’s music nicely observed.

The singing on this disc is very fine indeed. Solos are well taken and the choir as a group blends extremely well and sings with excellent tone and great clarity. Several of the pieces are accompanied by organ and the college’s Senior Organ Scholar, John Challenger, does a marvellous job. I relished especially his splendid contributions - very different from each other in character - to the Jackson and Mathias pieces.

It only remains to say that the Chandos sound is up to the label’s usual exalted standard - I listened to this hybrid SACD as a conventional CD. This most enjoyable disc will be a high quality Christmas present for a musical friend - or to give to yourself!

-- John Quinn, MusicWeb International

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On Christmas Night / Nethsingha, Choir of St. John's
Chandos Oct 2011
SACD
$21.99